The No. 10  Mid-Prairie boys suffered a heartbreaking 2-1 loss at West Branch on Friday when junior Gage Gingerich’s knee redirected Peyton Miller’s pass into the goal with less than two minutes left on the clock. 

The Golden Hawks managed to keep Miller, the state’s second-leading scorer, from adding to his total of 38 goals during Friday’s game. But Mid-Prairie’s offense also struggled against the Bears, who finished the regular season 10-1 in the soccer program’s second year. 

“I don’t know why, we just really came out flat for probably the first 30 minutes of the game,” Mid-Prairie coach Pat Cady said.

The Golden Hawk’s fell behind in the 21st minute of the game and the score remained 1-0 until Owen Trimpe scored the equalizer in the 52nd minute of play.  

“They have a lot of speed, I’ll give them that,” Cady said. “ But as far as being super dangerous with the ball, it really wasn’t that situation. It was more... put the ball into space and then try to create some chaos. And I thought we handled that pretty well. They got one goal out of it, but I think we kind of tuned that up. 

“But our biggest enemy tonight was not being able to be creative enough and put them in the back of the net.”

The Golden Hawks were outshot 22-16, and had the majority of their 11 shots on goal during the second half.

“They were playing one guy deep center, and so at halftime we just basically said that we needed to knock the ball wide, get higher and deeper into the corners and start drawing that center back out,” Cady said. “And for some reason, we just weren’t applying it until late in the game and then we started having success.”

Justice Jones had 12 saves in just his second game at the goalkeeper position, and he stopped all four of Miller’s shots on net. 

It was the fourth loss in five games for Mid-Prairie after a 7-0 start. 

Mid-Prairie hosts Pella Christian (2-11) in a postseason game on Thursday, May 20. Cash will not be taken at the gate, all tickets must be purchased through Hometown Ticketing.

The winner advances to the substate semifinal at Albia on Monday, May 24. Albia (10-2) is the no. 2 seed in 1A substate 6. 

The no. 1 seed likely waiting in the substate final is West Liberty (11-3), who defeated Mid-Prairie 5-0 on Tuesday, May 11.

Junior Jahsiah Galvan scored three goals for the fourth-ranked Comets. Galvan and sophomore Juan Mateo have combined for 55 of West Liberty’s 86 goals this season. Only No. 1 Burlington Notre Dame has more total goals in class 1A. 

“We came out and we probably played a good 15 (minutes),” Cady said. “And then we had some defensive issues once again, they were kind of picking on a couple guys and until we got some things figured out, we had to figure out how to cover the overlaps, and then what they were doing -— dinking around in the corners. 

“And for quite a while it was a pretty evenly matched game.”

For various reasons, the Golden Hawks were without the starting goalkeeper, his backup, and the junior varsity keeper on Tuesday, so Justice Jones stepped in. 

“He was our trainer,” Cady explained. “We just said ‘hey, put some goalkeeping stuff on, and go out and have a good night. So he’s been filling in for us and I think he looks pretty solid.”

Jones made 11 saves in the loss. Cady said the team will make some adjustments to the game plan, if they are fortunate enough to get a rematch in the substate final. 

“We made some notes and we kind of got an idea of what we want to do,” he said. “Hopefully we get to see these guys again in the postseason.”

Mid-Prairie 10, Keokuk 0

On Monday, Zues Fugate scored four goals as the Golden Hawks handed Keokuk its 13th straight loss of the season by a score of 10-0 on senior night. 

Gunnar Gingerich scored twice, while Jack Pennington and Owen Trimpe each had a goal and two assists. 

Aaron Slaubaugh and Tucker Miller each scored a goal. Ethan Trimpe and Jake Swartzendruber each had an assist as Mid-Prairie finished the regular season with a record of 9-4.