MECHANICSBURG – Better together.
All season Dock Mennonite has lived by the motto that it’s 18 as one, every player’s individual skills more valuable as part of a collective. If one player was down or having a bad day, she’d have 17 others behind her ready to pick her up.
It’s why a veteran team embraced a freshman as their lead scorer and why its coach was confident enough to call her shot on the first day of preseason it would end with a state title.
Ashley Brown turned in a supernova effort Saturday morning as the Pioneers defeated Riverview 5-1 to win the PIAA Class 1A girls soccer title, the first in program history.
“We had one big saying, better together,” senior co-captain Ashley Lapp said. “That brought us to where we are now by playing as a team.”
Brown put on a masterclass performance, the first-year varsity player scoring four straight goals after assisting on the team’s opener. While she may look diminutive, her ferociousness and tenacity pursuing the ball made her the biggest player on the field at Cumberland Valley’s Eagle View Middle School in terms of influence.
The four-spot wraps up a sublime freshman year for Brown with 41 goals, but following the better together mantra, much of her success was also due to the potency of senior wingers Ashley Lapp and Billinda Leisner. Brown, her knees bloodied a bit after a physical Riverview defense had no way to stop her, still couldn’t quite process just what she had done on Saturday.
“I just never expected I’d be able to score four goals in a state final, I’m just so happy we won,” Brown said. “Wanting the ball helps you want to keep going, want to keep scoring and that drive helps you win the game because you have a bunch of people wanting it and fighting for it.
“If you go out and fight for it, you’ll get the outcome you want.”
On the first day of practice back in August, Pioneers coach Stacey Vaitis-Dubost told her team it was going to win a state title. It may have seemed like a bold proclamation from the fifth-year head coach but she had confidence in this group.
Last year’s state run never got going, a swath of key injuries decimating the starting lineup even before losing to Moravian Academy in the first round. This season, focusing on physical and mental health while relying on all 18 on the roster, the Pioneers not only entered the postseason healthy, they were peaking.
“They all have worked so well together this entire season and we told them by the end of the season, you should be playing your best soccer,” Vaitis-Dubost said. “They’ve been doing just that.”
Dock scored 112 goals this season, the bulk coming from the trio of Brown, Leisner and Lapp, with the Pioneers showing a great variety not only in the run of play but off set pieces. The Pioneers took seven corners in the first half and each one saw Dock run a different look off it.
That approach led to their opening goal seven minutes into the game. Lapp hit the ball short to Brown, who passed it back to the senior, Lapp cutting in past a defender and lofting an effort to the far post.
“We have a lot of threats up front, everyone shoots, everyone is moving around the field all the time, so it’s definitely an advantage,” Lapp said. “You don’t usually see most teams with that.
“That was one of our set ones.”
The Pioneers had the start they wanted. They weren’t about to start slowing down.
“They showed up, our bus was late this morning to pick us up, so we were a little worried about that but the girls kept a good mindset,” Vaitis-Dubost said. “I knew they were ready to go, our other saying this season has been ‘foot on the gas,’ so we don’t let up until the final whistle.”
Dock continued to stack up shot attempts, corner kicks and other chances through the middle, the left and the right. Leisner, the right wing, was effective pushing the ball up the flank and either playing it in or drawing a corner or throw from an advantageous position.
The co-captain said there was a shared confidence among the players that if they played together, they’d be perfectly fine.
“If one person had an off day, they had 17 others there to support them,” Leisner said. “We grew a lot from last year to this year. We’re used to playing together, we knew how everyone played and all we had to do was really focus on each other.”
Brown took over from there. A short goal kick only got to the freshman, posted just beyond the 18, and Brown immediately drove back into the box and blasted home the first of her four for the 2-0 lead with 12:19 left in the first half.
“I just wanted to support everyone,” Brown said. “Everyone has different abilities that help provide to the team, so encouraging their skills really helps everyone to play their best on the field.
“They’re amazing girls. If they think that someone has talent, they trust and believe in them. It’s a lovely group and I’m going to miss the seniors very much.”
Her second came midway through the second half. Liv Moyer played a good ball forward that started it, Brown showing her tenacity to track it down then making a straight line for the goal, defenders in her wake.
Brown credited her dad for instilling the confidence in her to take it on herself, to take shots that were there and use her skills.
“It’s hard to match that,” Vaitis-Dubost said. “They were getting frustrated. They had two, three people on her at all times. We were comfortable to know, even with two or three people on her, she’s still coming out with the ball 90 percent of the time.”
Dock did a solid job defending Riverview’s Lola Abraham, an extremely talented senior bound for Pitt, for most of the game. Still, any time Abraham got a foot on the ball, something good happened and one of the Pioneers’ few breakdowns led to Abraham hitting a cross through the box that Mary Quinlan put away to cut the lead to 3-1 with 11:45 left.
The positive momentum barely lasted a minute. Dock’s front three combined for a great goal, Lapp hitting a cross off the right flank, Leisner running it down and hitting a service back across to the middle where Brown buried it for a hat trick.
“I think everyone going into the season had the confidence that we were going to win a state championship,” Leisner said. “It puts a little bit of pressure on us throughout the season, but we just had to remember step-by-step, first getting through districts then going into state play.”
Brown’s final goal was magic. Dribbling the ball across the box, defenders swarming around her, the freshman unleashed a screamer off her left foot that put her on the turf and the ball tucking into the upper 90 on the far post.
Celebrating by swinging her arms across her body and letting out a yell, Brown’s 41st goal of the season was as much an announcement as it was a spectacle.
“It makes me want to score one right back at them,” Brown said. “I knew the girl was coming in hard on my back, so that’s why I tried to turn as quick as possible and that’s when I saw I had a decent shot on goal so I took it.
“It was amazing it went in, I had no clue if it was going to.”
Vaitis-Dubost made a wave of late subs to make sure every player on the field to finish the game was a senior or a sister of one.
“It was surreal, it didn’t feel like we were about to win a state ‘chip,” Leisner said. “It felt like a regular game but once the bell went, everything changed. All the emotions ran through and I could tell everyone was just so happy.”
After receiving their medals and trophy, the Pioneers took them right over to their fan section lining the fence. Any celebration is always better together.
“I started crying in the last minute of the game just because I knew we had it,” Lapp said. “It was such an awesome feeling.”
DOCK MENNONITE 2 3 – 5
RIVERVIEW 0 1- 1
Goals: D – Ashley Lapp (Ashley Brown), Ashley Brown, Brown, Brown (Billinda Leisner), Brown.
