Historic night for Bellefonte girls! Captures D6 title

By Kenny Varner Jr.
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Updated: October 31, 2023

By Kenny Varner

WINGATE – The Lady Raiders showed its grit and determination in a marathon contest against Hollidaysburg Tuesday night.

While facing elimination, the Bellefonte girls found themselves trailing 1-0 heading into the final minutes in the District 6 Class AAA championship game against rival Hollidaysburg.

With defeat looming over their heads, the Lady Raiders pulled victory out of the grasp of defeat when Brooke Whitman found her way into position to push the game tying goal past the Tigers goalie, sending the game into an overtime period.

”It was the best feeling ever,” said Bellefonte coach Stacey Miller when asked about her feelings when Whitman hit the tying goal. “The one thing that people might not know about Brooke was she tore her ACL last year against Hollidaysburg in last year’s District title game. So for her to come back and hit that goal to send us into overtime, that’s the best it could have been written.”

The game would survive two overtimes and a round of shoot out before MacKenzie Mamolen would send her team to the title, sliding a shot past Goalie Natalie Foster, winning the shoot out 4-3.

”This is huge! This is our first district championship in the girls soccer program ever,” said Bellefonte coach Stacey Miller. “

With the win, the Lady Raiders added to its rich history, capturing their first District 6 title.

Bellefonte goalie Keira Whitman came up huge in the contest, notching 24 saves on the evening.

None bigger than in the shoot out round when she used a kick save to give the Red Raiders a chance to pull off the victory.

In the first shoot out period, both teams finished tied at three. The tie put the game into a sudden death round with the first person who scored and kept the other one off the board wins.

The teams were no stranger to each other as they played earlier in the season, which coincidentally went into an overtime contest, where the Tigers outlasted the Red Raiders 4-3.

Also, the game was a rematch from last year’s District 6 Class AAA championship game, also won by Hollidaysburg.

This time it was Bellefonte’s turn to get some revenge and put their name into the record books.

After a scoreless first half, the Tigers

and Lady Raiders battled trying to post its first goal.

Hollidaysburg struck first, Chloe Stoehr plastered an unassisted goal at 26:14, giving them the momentum.

Both defenses took over.

Bellefonte found themselves knocking on the door to posting a score but would come up empty time and time again in.

But that would not deter the Bellefonte squad. The crew kept staying with the game plan until the clocked slightly dipped below two minutes.

Then with 1:50 left, Whitman might have hit the most important goal in Red Raider history as she tied things at one.

In the both overtime periods, the Bellefonte defense bent but didn’t break, as the back-line was pure perfection, keeping the Tigers off the board, forcing the shoot out period.

”Hollidaysburg is a tough program and they’ve always been tough,” said Miller. “Our defense had to work hard. They made the defense work. Our defense kept stepping in and containing and keeping the ball in front of them.”

The night belonged to Bellefonte as they were able to outlast Hollidaysburg and in the process extended their season and secured the first title ever in team’s history.