Girls’ state soccer: Iowa City West is best

DES MOINES - Jackie Kaeding, Courtney Stoermer and Katja Koroleva finally have company. Iowa City West defeated West Des Moines Dowling, 1-0, on Saturday to win its second state girls' soccer championship, 11 years after the first.

A perennial contender at state, West (20-2) captured the elusive crown with a team of talented underclassmen who maintained their poise and composure time after time in tight games.

They won three one-goal games, including a double-overtime triumph in the quarterfinal.

'We knew we had some players with ability; what we didn't know is whether the team chemistry was going to come together,” West Coach Dave Rosenthal said. 'That team chemistry came together really early.”

'I feel like everybody has a say on this team, it's a lot of leadership,” junior Payton Pottratz said.

'I think it's the maturity of knowing how serious soccer is to all of us. I think the chemistry pushed us through and past other teams because we play for each other and it shows.”

The lone goal of the game came in the 25th minute.

'Regan (Steigleder) tapped the ball on to Leah (Rhodes), and Leah just pushed it by their outside back and played this great ball in,” Emma Cooper said. 'I was thankful I was on the other end.”

Cooper buried it in the net.

Dowling's talented, mobile forwards threatened West early in the game, but West's defense kept them at bay in the second half.

'Dowling made some adjustments at halftime,” Rosenthal said. 'We knew they were going to come more aggressively toward us, and we had to make some defensive adjustments.

'They dropped some players into the midfield and started controlling things, and we needed to be better organized defensively. They did a fantastic job. What a team effort.”

Junior goalie Caitlin Ryan was flawless, and the midfield controlled possession.

'We knew we had to protect and play solid defense, that they were going to come after us hard,” she said. 'We always possess the ball pretty well, and possessing it buys time and puts us in control of the game.”

West's ability to hog possession was key, as Steigleder ran up and down the field and stuck her nose into the Maroons' offensive thrusts.

'We just worked our butts off,” Steigleder said. 'We weren't going to let them score. We put a lot of our effort into the last 40 minutes. They have two really good forwards, so I wasn't going to let them have anything.”

This was a game that went according to West's script.

'We played hard; we moved the ball well; we did everything we wanted to,” Cooper said. 'We've been building up to this all season. We couldn't ask for anything more.

'This is exactly the kind of game we wanted to play.”

Rosenthal loves that 2004 team but he said comparisons were apples to oranges because girls' soccer has grown so much and players have so much better coaching. This year's team simply has more talent and understands the game that much more.

'But they had the desire and passion to win, just like this group did,” Rosenthal said.