The best season in Martin County girls soccer program history came to a disappointing end in Miami as Lourdes Academy blanked the Tigers 4-0 at Columbus High School in a 6A state semifinal Friday.
The Bobcats (12-2-1), the defending 6A state champions and winners of the title three of the last four years, picked up two goals from Tessa Abreu and got goals from Coco Aguilar and Oli Borroto to advance to a meeting with Venice on Mar. 5.
With their fourth consecutive road trip and spanning over 1,200 miles of travel to Tampa, Melbourne, Lakeland and finally down to Miami, the Tigers (17-3-2) ultimately achieved program firsts that will be remembered by Martin County head coach Josh Moberg for a long time to come.
“There wasn’t a lot of sadness at the end, I think the girls were really happy with how well we played and what they were able to accomplish,” Moberg said. “Making history for the school for our first Final Four, and I told the girls, they can’t hang their heads. I’m extremely proud of what they’ve done and now this has to be the new expectation. It’s not a dream anymore to be here, let it be an expectation.”
The future of the program for Martin County is extremely promising as their starting lineup consisted primarily of juniors and freshman that all will be back another year.
The lone senior that will depart will be sorely missed as forward Emma Johnson emerged as one of the area’s top goalscorers after not being featured much as a scoring threat her first two seasons.
Scoring 14 goals as a senior coming off of a 23-goal campaign her junior year, Moberg knows that where this program was when she entered to where it has come now is due in large part to Johnson’s leadership on and off the field.
“As our only senior, we applauded her for her efforts the past four years what she’s meant to this program,” Moberg said. “She’s been a trooper through the whole thing, when she was a freshman, we were not very good, we were a little better her sophomore year and we had some good years at the end of her career. She knows what it was like when we were down a bit.”
