“She was phenomenal. She is one of the most confident keepers in the state when it comes to PKs, and so we’re super thankful for that,” Centennial head coach Christa Carlson said of Metz. “The minute that she gets into the net it’s lights out. I’m so confident with her when it comes to PKs that I was very confident that we were going to win it.” 

Lights out may be an understatement. Metz faced five Huskies in the shootout and forced four misses. She saved three of the penalties, which matched her save total from the 100 minutes of regulation and extra time.  

Mau stopped two of Centennial’s four penalty kicks, and she made three saves in the game as well. Two came in the second period of extra time, having to dive both times to keep Andover’s season alive.  

Marisa Frost and Naasifaayee Bula converted their penalty kicks to help send Centennial to the final. Carlson said her team had been practicing penalties for the past two weeks in preparation for the section tournament, and it paid off tonight.  

It wasn’t very surprising to see these teams play out a low-scoring 100 minutes. When they met in the regular season, the Huskies (12-4-1, 9-1-1) won 1-0 thanks to a goal from Addie Dobratz.  

Dobratz was on the score sheet again in the semifinal — her team-leading 16th of the season — heading home a perfectly delivered cross from Skylyn Jorgenson.  

“The goal that Addie had to tie it up was a beautiful goal, and we’ve been scoring like that all year,” Andover head coach Tracey Griess said.  

Griess said she wanted to get the one seed in the section tournament to avoid playing Centennial in the semifinal, emphasizing how tough it is to play the Cougars. Regardless of the result, she’s proud of her team’s performance. 

“We talked before the game, we talked at halftime that as long as we put 100 percent out there and give everything we have we can hold our heads high, and I think they did that,” she said.  

Centennial will now have to get ready for the section final on Tuesday against Blaine. The Cougars lost to the Bengals 2-0 in the regular season back on Aug. 31.  

“Obviously they have a lot of good players, it’s going to be a really, really good match and be a very similar match to this where either team can very much win it,” Carlson said.