CHS 

CHARLOTTESVILLE — The Black Knights and the Blue Streaks each wanted the Conference 23 crown…badly. The two teams played to a 1-1 tie in double overtime near the beginning of the season at Harrisonburg High School, previewing the epic match between these two teams for the Conference 23 crown at CHS on Thursday, May 28.

Charlottesville was 9-4-3 and the 3-seed entering the playoffs. They started out the tournament by hammering the 6-seed Louisa 13-0, preparing with a long-wanted rematch with Fluvanna. The 2-seeded Flucos were the last team to beat Charlottesville, 2-1 in overtime on Charlottesville’s home field. Charlottesville beat Fluvanna at Fluvanna 2-1 earlier in the year. Thanks to a goal by the senior Mica Girstantas with under 5 minutes to play, the Black Knights advanced to the Conference Final, winning 2-1 at Fluvanna for a second time this season.

The final was to be played at Charlottesville High School, since CHS hosted the tournament. Still, the 1-seed Harrisonburg (who had just beaten the 4-seed John Handley 3-0) was the “home” team and wore white jerseys while the Black Knights wore their black and orange away uniforms. From the start, the large crowd at Theodose Stadium knew they were in for a great game.

Charlottesville possessed the ball for most of the first half, but thanks to Harrisonburg’s incredibly skilled and long goalkeeper, both shot attempts in the half were saved. Harrisonburg had many fast breaks to get to Charlottesville’s goal, but thanks to the amazingly quick Yahya Mohammed, most of the would-be shots or goals were deflected by the sophomore.  With 22:15 to go in the half, Harrisonburg broke away from the defense but missed over the goal post. The score was 0-0 at halftime.

In the second half, Charlottesville switched up their positions. Musa Mohammed was moved to offense (he played defense in the first half). With 38:18 to go, Charlottesville had a corner kick. Barun Tamang took kick and the ball flew high and right into the swarm of Knights and Blue Streaks. The ball bounced several times before ricocheting off of some players and Thomas Birle got just enough of it to cause it to roll into the goal. The Charlottesville crowd went crazy as the Knights took the lead, 1-0…..but the celebration was short lived. Under 3 minutes later, with 35:49 to go, Harrisonburg beat the defense and scored, tying up the game at 1 apiece. Charlottesville had many other chances to score in the half, with 5 corner kicks and great plays by Abibi Osman and Musa, but the Harrisonburg defense stayed strong as the game went into overtime.

With under 20 seconds to go in a rather uneventful first overtime, Abibi had a chance to shoot the ball, but his shot attempt was foiled as the buzzer sounded to end the first overtime.

The second overtime was much more eventful. Thomas Birle had many great plays offensively, but was unable to score. With under a minute to go, it looked as if the game would go to Penalty Kicks, but the Knights had a chance. A corner kick bounced off the Harrisonburg defense, but Campbell Brickhouse for the Knights got the ball and wove through the defense to get to the left end of the goal. From there, he delivered a pass right to the Harrisonburg goalie, who swapped it away, but senior Musa Mohammed recovered it and shot the ball from a few yards out. The ball went in with 41.7 seconds to go. The Black Knight faithful went crazy, and the Blue Streaks were unable to score in the last 40 seconds, making the Charlottesville black Knights the Conference 23 Champions. The Black Knights are now 12-4-3.


Charlottesville will host (2) Sherando, the Conference 21 Runner Up.  The game will be on Monday, June 1st, at 8:00.