BY JIM HENRY
Just when it appeared overtime was imminent, Webb City scored on its final push up the field.
Manuel Cornelio's goal with 23 seconds remaining to lift the Cardinals past Carl Junction 2-1 on Tuesday night in a Class 3 District 12 soccer semifinal at Bulldog Stadium.
With the come-from-behind victory, the second-seeded Cardinals (10-15) advance to play top-seeded Neosho (11-10-1) in the championship game at 6 p.m. Thursday. The Wildcats beat McDonald County 3-1 in the opening semifinal.
Webb City had possession about 75 yards from the goal with 35 seconds leftin regulation. David Aguilar kicked the ball from near the left sideline
toward the goal, and Cornelio managed to get a foot on the ball and find the back of the net to snap the 1-1 deadlock.
"David Aguilar has been our set piece specialist from distance all year long," Cardinals coach Nick Harmon said. "He put it right where it needed to be. Our guys were quick to react to it and got the touch they needed.
"Manuel made a very acrobatic play. He's a good athlete, a good scorer. He has that knack, that instinct about him."
Carl Junction (4-13) controlled play for the first 50 minutes but led just 1-0 on Camryn Simon's goal off an assist from Andrew Doyle with six minutes left in the first half.
"We were one play away again," Bulldogs coach Ed Miller said. "Our kids played really hard tonight. They played well enough to win. They outworked them, outhustled them I thought for most of the game. We had several opportunities after we were up 1-0. We were down there close, had tons of chances to score ... it just wouldn't go in. Then they got a goal on the other side, and then there was a 50-50 ball in the box at the end, and they toe-poked it, and he kept it on frame and it goes in."
The Cardinals tied it in the 52nd minute when Cornelio headed in a Tristan Barroeta corner kick from the left corner. That goal put some pep in Webb City's step.
"We just weren't hustling at midfield, weren't winning those 50-50 balls," senior forward Connor Mahaffey said. "Once we scored that goal, it lit a fire underneath us, and we came out super strong and put them away in the last minutes."
For Carl Junction, it was a capsule of its season.
"I think if we score another goal, we're good to go," Miller said. "It's kind of been like that all year where we would play close enough and we don't get that separation when we're playing better than the other team. We let them stick around long enough to get a lucky break or a lucky shot or a great shot that goes in to tie it up. We needed to put them away, and we never did."
Joplin Globe 10/31/2018 (Used by permission)