MADISON — After a magical penalty shootout win over McFarland in the WIAA Division 3 sectional semifinals, Sugar River lost a 1-0 heartbreaker to Madison Edgewood with the rights to a state berth on the line.

“I thought we played as tough of a game as we could,” Raiders coach John Ziperski said of the June 8 game against Edgewood. “I think the recovery time between Thursday and Saturday just wasn’t enough. I felt like we played a better game on Thursday, but pulling a miracle out twice is difficult.”

The Crusaders (17-2-2), ranked third in Division 3 in the final Wisconsin Soccer Coaches Association poll, scored the only goal of the game minutes before halftime. Sugar River goalkeeper Rachael Heittola made an impressive save off a hard Edgewood rush, but the ball caromed back to Edgewood’s Hailey Rothwell who found teammate and Badgers-commit Maddie Cruz, who netted the game’s only score. Both players were all-state a season ago.

“We had a great save by Rachael, and it was a deflection out and a cleanup putback. It was unfortunate that we couldn’t clear it,” Ziperski said.

The Raiders changed its formation in the second half in an attempt to spark some offense, but the Crusaders were up to the challenge.

“Second half I pushed numbers up. I decided that playing our 4-5-1 in the first half we went to basically a 3-5-2 in the second half to try to get numbers up. They had a couple more opportunities, but not too many. We just couldn’t get through their defense,” Ziperski said. “Edgewood is amazing. They have four D-1 players. They have youth, they have skill — they are just incredible.”

Sugar River (19-3-4, ranked eight) defeated Edgewood in the sectional semifinal in 2018, but the Crusaders topped the Raiders 2-0 in the season-opener this spring. Edgewood scored 3 of the 6 goals against Heittola and the Raiders’ defense allowed all season.

Heittola, a senior who had six saves in the game, will play basketball for Bemidji State next year.

“I think she could play D-1 soccer, but she wasn’t recruited for that — it wasn’t her biggest focus,” Ziperski said. “You don’t reload with a 6-foot-2 goalkeeper that’s all-state.”

The Raiders will have other positions to replace as well with seniors graduating. One, Sydney Gentilli, injured her knee during the season but gutted out an inspiring performance in the June 6 win over McFarland. Gentilli only played a handful of minutes against Edgewood, however.

“It was too physical of a game for me to chance it. I think we counted that near the second half they had like 10 fouls. I just couldn’t risk it. She understood, too,” Ziperski said. 

Julia McNamar will play at Milwaukee School of Engineering next year, and Ziperski said several other seniors stepped into major roles this year that will have to be replaced.

“That’s the saddest part, that you know there is going to be an end game — whether it was this Saturday or next Saturday, it doesn’t go on forever. This senior class has been to state twice — that’s a pretty big deal, and they made it to the sectional finals again,” Ziperski said.

The future looks bright for the Raiders, however. 

“The youth (program) has really helped. I think our approach at the end of the season helps, because we’re bringing 25 (players) to all these experiences,” Ziperski said. “Even if the girls aren’t getting on the field at the end of the year, there’s enough of them that have seen it and lived it. It feels like a re-load because we are preparing for next year at the end of this year, and our numbers allow us to do that. Hopefully that method will translate next year.”

WIAA Division 3 Sectional Semifinal

Sugar River defeats McFarland in PKs, 4-3

MCFARLAND — With an inconsistent offense, Ziperski set his team up to play to its strength — defense. By the time the overtimes came, that meant playing through the two overtimes scoreless and taking their chances in a penalty kick shootout.

“Sometimes the soccer gods aren’t always fair, and on this day, we played to our strength, which is our defense,” Ziperski said. “We’ve been working for shootouts for a long time and knew that there would be a good chance we would go to a shootout if we were still in it.”

The defense held up its end of the bargain, containing McFarland throughout the contest. Not to say Heittola, an all-state keeper, didn’t make some circus-style saves to keep the Spartans (18-1-2, ranked sixth) off the board.

“Hat’s off to McFarland. They have a really good team, and I respect everything that they are doing (with the program),” Ziperski said. “They have just so much incredible talent, but our girls dug in and did what they are good at, which was limiting (McFarland’s) potential. I’m proud of them.”

Heittola had 10 saves, while McFarland counterpart Katie Hildebrandt only needed one.

“It just makes us all more confident when she saves that first goal. We’re all so confident in her because she’s a beast in the goal and saves anything that comes at her,” senior Kirsten Krantz said. “Occasionally we did feel outnumbered, but we made sure we kept our shape in the midfield to keep us spaced well, and we made sure we communicated. We’ve struggled with that in the past, but I think this game we did well.”

Gentilli completely tore her ACL a few weeks prior to the sectional run, but kept working out with the team, keeping hope alive for a chance to play again.

“She played a little bit on Senior Night, but this was the first one where she said, ‘I’m playing, I’m going out there,’” Ziperski said. “Her dad’s on the staff and he was swallowing his tongue as much as possible. It’s not the right thing to do, but it’s something she wanted to do. And she was able to give us really valuable minutes in the midfield. You can tell we are a really different team without her.”

Despite her doctor’s request to not play — as well as her father, assistant coach Bob Gentilli — Sydney Gentilli came on for a five-minute stretch early in the first half. 

“First, my surgeon definitely told me ‘no,’” Gentilli said. “I know my dad didn’t want me to, but it doesn’t matter. My love for the game and my love for my team, I couldn’t do it without them. I was so determined. I told my coach ‘I’m playing in this game.’”

Feeling ready to get back out on the field, Gentilli re-entered. She played much of the second half and the overtimes.

“She is a part of the heart and soul of this team — it is a major inspiration,” Krantz said of seeing her teammate back on the pitch. “She is a leader, the backbone of the center-mid, and when she went down, I was sad. I was really happy seeing her playing again, and even though she wasn’t at 100% she did really well.”

McFarland had a similar injury during the game as junior Emily Gates went down with a gruesome knee injury in the 77th minute. The crowd went silent as Gates’ screams echoed off the school and construction site adjacent to the field.

Just minutes before, Heittola made a pair of back-to-back saves on a Spartan rush to the net, sprawling out from her knees and corralling the rebounded kick that appeared destined for the back of the net.

The first overtime saw little threat for a goal, with Sugar River getting a corner kick opportunity. In the second overtime, McFarland had ample opportunities — four in the brief 10-minute period — but was unable to capitalize on the Capitol Conference champion Raiders.

In the pivotal PK shootout Sugar River won the toss and opted to play goal first. Heittola stopped the shot of Lexi Hettiger right off the bat, diving to her left and leaving the Spartan senior stunned.

“For me, I know that I have to save that first one. If I save that first one, then I know that we can do it,” said Heittola, who turned around and took the Raiders’ first shot, netting a goal and putting her team up 1-0 in the five-round shootout all by herself. “I actually used to be a forward, so shooting comes naturally to me.”

McFarland tied it at 1-1, but Sugar River senior Ellawyn Fong flushed a shot just inside the left post to make it 2-0. Another Heittola save and a successful Jaylynn Benson attempt had the Raiders up 3-1. McFarland would score on back-to-back kicks and Sugar River junior Brooke Watrud missed wide right to even it at 3-3 with Kristen Krantz stepping up to the line.

“I was so nervous, but I took some deep breaths to calm down, otherwise I was going to sail it over the post,” Krantz said. “As I ran up, I tried to focus and tune everything out. For the past week, I stayed after practice and practiced every shot to know that I could make it.”

Krantz stuck with the general theme of the shootout and went left, adding enough power to get the shot passed Hildebrandt, the Spartans sophomore keeper. She then turned around running, opened her arms and was bearhugged by teammates halfway between the box and midfield.

It was the 21st shutout of the season for Sugar River, a program record.

“To limit only five goals up until this point in the season — and this is a deep run for us — we knew that everything after the Platteville (regional final) game, that everything was gravy,” Ziperski said. “We knew we won the games that we thought we had a great chance of winning, and we knew these next couple of games were for the benefit of staying together for a few more days.”