By Andy Tabor
Photos by Tyler Morris
The Coppell Cowgirls dream of repeating as state 5-A champs ended Tuesday night in Hebron. The girls lost 2-1 to McKinney Boyd in regulation in a very hard fought game. McKinney Boyd is the top team in the state and are a staggering 25-0-3.
The Cowgirls only goal was a header scored by Stanford signee Chioma Obogagu to light the scoreboard up first. The Lady Broncos Emily Reid, who is an Oklahoma commit, came down after a botched Coppell corner kick and made an amazing goal that left Coppell fans and teammates staggered. At halftime the game was tied at 1-1 and still the Cowgirls believed that they could win.
“Everyone on the field felt like we could get [the lead] back soon,” senior defender Spayne Avant said. “We just tried to fight throughout the game.”
Coppell had multiple chances in the second half to take the lead against the best team they had played this year. However, the Cowgirls could not capitalize and eventually ended up giving up the game winning goal with less than fifteen minutes left in the game. The Cowgirls could not score in the final minutes and eventually lost. The team had higher expectations for this season but unfortunately they fell short.
“It was a disappointing way to finish the year and I wish we could’ve played better in the game,” junior captain Danielle Herubin said. “Either way we would’ve met them during the postseason and they just played better to win.”
However disappointing this finish is, the Cowgirls were undefeated in district play and for the most part lived up to their pre-season hype of being the number one ranked team in the nation. The team will have many bright spots returning next year, including Herubin, junior Bear Bass, Obogagu, and sophomore Lindsey Meyer. With this talented core of productive players, the Cowgirls should be able to build off of this challenge and be title contenders next season as well. For the Cowgirls to be successful they will need to have short memories of their game against McKinney Boyd.
“I am still shocked that we lost,” Herubin said. “We need to honor our seniors during the offseason and work extremely hard to get back to playing our best.”
For Coppell seniors, their state championship last season will be their everlasting memory of high school soccer, but not winning their senior year is a tough pill to swallow. For many seniors continuing to play at the next level in college, the bad taste left in their mouth should motivate them to work hard in the summer and prepare for a productive freshman year.
