Local youth girls soccer team wins Rec Cup state title

Behind a tough defense, Harbor Gators bring home WA Youth Soccer state championship

The Harbor Gartors, a girls youth soccer team that competes in the Washington State Youth Soccer association, earned a state title by winning the Rec Cup on Saturday, Dec. 8 at the Starfire Complex in Seattle.

The Gators, a team that plays in the 15-and-under division and is comprised of athletes from Aberdeen and Hoquiam, advanced to the semifinal round by going 3-0 in a Rec Cup qualifier in mid-November.

In the quarterfinal round, the Gators defeated the Washington United Storm 4-3 in a penalty-kick shootout after the two teams played to a scoreless tie in regulation on Dec. 1 in Puyallup.

Macy Cogburn, Madi Harp, Alice Early and Char Gutierrez each scored in the shootout. Gutierrez, who was the starting goalkeeper for Aberdeen High School as a freshman in the fall, made two stops to give the Gators the win over the favored Storm, who entered the contest with an 86-5 goal differential.

From there, the Gators advanced to the semifinal round, where they defeated Bainbridge 1-0 on a breakaway goal by Emily Mcfadden just before the end of the first half on Dec. 8.

Later that day, the Gators completed their run to the state championship with a 1-0 victory over the Vancouver Tiger Flies.

The championship goal came off the foot of Gutierrez, who came up from her goalkeeper spot to take a free kick from approximately 28-yards out. Gutierrez ripped a shot over the wall and into back of the net to give the Gators the 1-0 lead with 20 minutes left in the contest.

“She just drilled the shot,” Gators head coach Dan Early said. “She said she knew it was going in right when it left her foot. … She said, ‘Yeah, I hit it well.’”

The Gators then had to hold on to preserve the slim lead.

“(Vancouver) was really good. They had two good forwards but our defense was just shutting down everything,” said Early, who brought an extra defender back to thwart the Tiger Flies’ comeback attempts. “They were threatening multiple times, but we kept shutting them down and, finally, they blew the whistle.”

Having achieved their goal, the Gators erupted.

“They ran together and mobbed each other at midfield,” Early said. “They’ve been working hard for three years for this.”