Ryan Meza is an ASU Cronkite School of Journalism student assigned to cover high school sports for AZPreps365.com

PHOENIX – For the first time in program history, Sunrise Mountain boys soccer advanced to the 5A state championship game in dramatic fashion.

The Mustangs defeated a 2021 4A state champion in Phoenix Washington on a wild Saturday night, winning 3-1 on penalty kicks. About seven hours earlier the Mustangs girls started the 5A soccer semifinals by booking their first finals trip with a penalty kicks upset of Gilbert Campo Verde.

The No. 7 seed Sunrise Mountain boys will take on No. 1 Casteel for the 5A title at 7:15 p.m. Tuesday night at Central High School.

“We are ready,” Sunrise Mountain senior forward Bryce Grozier said. “People don’t expect anything from us but here we are, we are going to make it count.”

Similar to a Netflix series, this match left you wanting more, and it gave more in the most unexpecting ways.

The Mustangs had a 1-0 lead with 16 minutes remaining after a goal from Grozier. As the clock reached one minute, Sunrise Mountain started to feel the excitement of going to the state final.

Sunrise Mountain cleared the ball away from its opposing goal allowing the Rams to have one more push.

“One of the things that I preach right from the get-go is, ‘the game is not over until the end,’” Washington head coach Adam Roberts said.

As the seconds counted down, the Rams rammed their way close to the goal and senior forward Jorge Lopez tapped the ball in for a game tying goal with one second left.

The Washington bench cleared as they ran around the pitch in celebration while Sunrise Mountain head coach Erik Andersen punted a spare ball over the bleachers in frustration.

 

 

The Washington players who rushed the pitch received yellow cards as an AIA rule is that bench players cannot step on the field during the time of play. Since there was one second remaining in regulation, those players were gifted yellow cards.

The match was filled with cards as nine yellow cards were handed to players and coaches along with some fans being ejected from the game.

The first yellow card of the match was handed to Andersen as he went on to the field to check on his fourth injured player during the match and had some choice words for the referee.

“My frustration was just how physical we let it be,” Andersen said. “I was worried someone was going to get hurt.”

Andersen said it was a really physical game which isn't something the Mustangs experienced all year, so they were in a different environment.

“We finished with four guys that normally would have been on the field that couldn’t go back out there,” Andersen said.

Both teams were talking back and forth and getting physical on the field throughout the second half of the match until separated by the officials.

However, there was even more commotion off the field that stopped play several times as fans were verbally attacking the players, coaches and referees.

In the second half, coach Roberts requested that four young ladies and a mother in the Sunrise Mountain bleachers be asked to leave as they were heckling him throughout the game.

“I’d be lying if I was saying that it didn’t disrupt me, it did,” Roberts said. “Normally I’m pretty good about restraining myself and holding back. In this particular case, the attacks became personal towards my children, my daughter goes to Sunrise, and that to me shouldn’t happen.”

Another Sunrise Mountain fan and several Washington fans were ejected by the head referee for using foul language towards the players and officials.

Police officers on duty had to escort fans out of the complex per officials’ orders.

“Those people are here to cheer on their teams, not to tear other people down,” Roberts said. “They need to take a step back and realize we are here to cheer on these young men and at the end, one side is going to win, and one side is going to lose and we applaud the effort.”

After all of the nonsense off the field was handled, the physical play on the field continued and escalated.

Similar to the first half of the match, extra time was scoreless, as the score remained even at one. However, Washington had three shots-on-goal nine minutes into extra time, but Mustangs’ freshman goalkeeper Mason Tumey stopped each shot.

As the first 10 minutes of extra time expired, Tumey jumped up on the bench waving his arms to hype up the crowd.

Tumey was then subbed out for senior goalkeeper Nathan Givens who entered the game for the first time for the latter half of extra time. Since it was the last ten minutes of extra time, both teams were not allowed to make any substitutions going into the penalty shootout.

Whoever was on the field at the end of extra time had to participate in the penalty shootout.

“As the game went on, I thought we were probably going to PKs,” Givens said. “So, I started getting myself mentally ready and then set my mind to it.”

Givens blocked the Rams first two spot kicks giving them a 1-0 advantage in PKs. Washington later got one goal and a block which tied it at one with Sunrise Mountain attempting its fourth shot.

Sunrise Mountain made its fourth shot giving them a 2-1 lead and the Rams were up to take their game tying shot. Rams senior Jimmy Perez Pimental stepped up to go one-on-one with Givens.

“I know where this guy is going,” Givens said when explaining what he was thinking in the moment. “He was going right.”

Pimental went right and Givens made the stop.

“We prepared for it,” Andersen said. “I knew he was our best stop choice.”

The stop led to senior Kyle Foster scoring the game winning goal to send the Mustangs to the state championship and an ice bath for Givens as Andersen dumped the water cooler on him.

“We’ve had tough games that we’ve had to grind out like this before,” Grozier said. “We know we can do it and we wanted to do it again. We wanted to make it to the state final. This is the farthest we’ve ever made it, history!”