State soccer brackets set

WASILLA — Patrick O’Neill did a double take after seeing the girls state soccer bracket for the first time Sunday.

The fourth-year Wasilla High girls soccer head coach couldn’t believe it. Not only was O’Neill happy with his team’s first-round matchup, a quarterfinal date with West Valley Thursday at 5 p.m. at Eagle River High School, but by random draw, the system ASAA uses to seed its state soccer tournaments, the top 4 teams from the 2014 state event landed on the bottom side of the bracket.

The result has a pair of Northern Lights Conference teams sharing the top half of the bracket. Wasilla opens against Mid-Alaska Conference champ West Valley, and NLC champion Kenai meets Southeast Conference champion Juneau-Douglas.

The bottom side includes three teams that have combined for the last seven girls’ state titles (South Anchorage, Dimond and Service) and Soldotna, which is making its sixth straight trip to state and seventh appearance in eight years.

“I was pretty excited to see the way it broke down,” O’Neill said Monday. “All of those scenarios.”

Wasilla has seen six of the seven other teams in the 2015 bracket, including West Valley. The Warriors suffered a 1-0 loss to the Wolfpack in Fairbanks early in the season. O’Neill said West Valley played well against the Warriors, but it was early in the season, and Wasilla hit the West Valley turf not long after a six-hour bus ride to the Interior. The Warriors have made ample change since, tweaking systems and personnel.

“I like our chances,” O’Neill said. “We match up pretty well against West Valley.”

The Warriors will see either Kenai or Juneau-Douglas on the second day. Wasilla played a pair of tough match against Kenai this season. The teams tied 1-1 during the regular season, and the Kardinals edged Wasilla 2-1 in overtime in the NLC semifinals.

Wasilla did not see Juneau during the regular season.

The Wasilla girls team is one of two Valley squads in the ASAA state soccer championships. The Colony boys also qualified.

Colony, which won its 11th NLC title since 1998, opens its tournament Thursday at 7 p.m. against Eagle River against South Anchorage.

The Knights and Wolverines are no strangers, last meeting in the state tournament in the 2013 boys’ title game. Colony and South also played early in the year, with the Wolverines taking a 5-0 victory.

Colony head coach Jeremy Johnson said its tough to compare his team’s loss to South to where the Knights are now.

“It’s hard to judge. We weren’t playing everybody. They weren’t playing everybody. It was our second match of the season. There was still snow on the edges of the field,” Johnson said. “It was what it was. They were five goals better than us that day. Hopefully they’re not five goals better than us Thursday.”

Colony enters the tournament as the defending state champion. The Knights beat Dimond 3-2 in double-overtime last season it win their second state crown in school history. Colony lost a remarkable amount of talent from that 2014 squad, and the team is completely different from when the Knights faced South for the 2013 state title. Senior Harrison Menard is the lone athlete who played in that match. Despite the changes, Johnson said new talent this year has stepped in nicely to fill the void.

“We’ve seen a lot of improvement. There was a ton of turnover from our state championship run two years ago,” Johnson said.

Johnson said it’s been a growing process, but the Knights have come together to form a cohesive unit.

Colony was dominant during the NLC championship, beating Kodiak 9-1 in the quarterfinals and Grace Christian 5-0 in the semifinals and Kenai Central 4-1 in the championship game. The Knights have allowed only three goals in their last six matches.

Colony and Juneau share the top half of the bracket with Juneau-Douglas and West Valley. On the bottom side, NLC rivals Homer and Kenai face off, and Dimond will play Cook Inlet Conference title Bartlett.