ST. GEORGE — It was an eventful night in Region 9 soccer, with the standings taking a on new look thanks to Snow Canyon’s overtime win over Cedar and Desert Hills’ road victory at Dixie. That turn of events moves the Thunder into first place with 16 points, one ahead of now second-place Cedar and two ahead of the third-place Warriors.

Indeed, with five region games left, the region title is definitely up for grabs.

In an afternoon game 19 days ago, the Lady Reds had beaten Snow Canyon 2-1 up at CHS. The Warriors never led in that game, but it was a different story Tuesday night at Warrior Stadium in SC’s 2-1 victory.

Snow Canyon got a touch goal from Jenny Stewart 18 minutes into the contest (off an Ashley Brindley assist) to take the lead and held onto the advantage for nearly 57 minutes of game time. But Cedar’s Tasha Kamachi pounded in a eye-high kick with 5:37 left in regulation to tie things up.

“We had a lot of chances to take a two-goal lead and just didn’t make it happen,” Warriors coach Kenny Kunde said. “I think we out-played Cedar, but credit to them, they just kept battling.”

In high school soccer, overtime is sudden death, with two 10-minute periods being played if no one scores. A tie would have been OK with Cedar as the Lady Reds would have been able to hang on to at least a share of first place.

But the tandem of Stewart and Mishayla Fausett had other ideas. The two SC forwards teamed up on a corner kick to end the game with 2:21 left in the first overtime — a golden goal Fausett said she won’t soon forget.

“For sure our spirits went down a little bit after Cedar’s goal,” she said. “But we tried to stay positive. We’ve worked so hard. We’ve had some double overtime games, so we didn’t want that. We knew we had to hurry and get one in.”

Stewart, who is known for her near-prefect touch on corner kicks, got her chance in the OT. After Cedar lost one off the end line, Stewart set up her corner from the left side. It sailed into the crowd in front of the net and Fausett pounded it home.

“I’ve still got chills from it,” Stewart said. “We were fighting so hard and they were there when we needed them. It bounced right in the middle and then Shay was there to put it in.”

Snow Canyon was fairly dominant in the first half, but Cedar came out aggressively in the second half and had three or four shots on goal in the first 10 minutes after intermission. SC goalkeeper Mada Mooring was spectacular on several of those, keeping the Warriors on top.

SC had two golden opportunities as the clock wound down under 30 minutes, with a cross from Stewart finding a teammate, who just missed from in front. Another shot from 20 yards or so by Stewart was just wide left.

Cedar countered with two good looks, one at 20:20 and the other at 19:55, but Mooring punched them both away. Snow Canyon had one last hard shot in regulation with under 10 seconds to go, but it was wide.

Cedar got one good shot away in OT, but it sailed just over the crossbar and the counter by the Warriors led to Stewart’s assist on Fausett’s goal.

“This was huge for us … now we still have a shot at winning the region,” Kunde said. “We need Desert Hills to beat Cedar and if they do, we could have a shot at winning the region in the last game of the year. That last game against Desert Hills could be for first place or for fourth place.”

The Thunder were able to grab the slim region lead by beating Dixie 3-1 Tuesday night.

Makayla Lewis scored twice in the first half to put the Thunder on top against the Flyers. DH then added an insurance goal by Brooklyn Lott to make it 3-0.

The only thing in doubt late in the match was whether or not Thunder keeper Brittany Moore could record the clean sheet. Dixie striker Starlee Woodbury broke up the shutout with a goal to get Dixie on the scoreboard.

Lewis has scored all three of her goals this season against Dixie. Lott’s netfinder was her 12th of the season. For Woodbury, it was her fourth goal of the year.

Pine View further enhanced its plan to get into the playoffs with a 2-1 win at Hurricane. The Lady Panthers have 13 points, just three behind league-leader Desert Hills.

Region 9	W	L	T	GS	GA	Pts.	W	L	T	GS	GA	Pts.
Desert Hills	5	1	1	13	4	16	7	4	2	29	12	23
Cedar	5	2	0	13	6	15	9	4	0	40	12	27
Snow Canyon	4	1	2	14	7	14	5	4	4	21	26	19
Pine View	4	2	1	9	9	13	7	2	3	21	17	24
Dixie	1	6	0	5	17	3	3	8	0	13	22	9
Hurricane	0	7	0	1	11	0	4	8	1	23	19	13

Email: [email protected]

Twitter: @oldschoolag

Copyright St. George News, SaintGeorgeUtah.com LLC, 2015, all rights reserved.