AUBURNDALE - In a twist of fate, a region playoff journey of hat tricks and shutouts for the St. Johns Country Day School girls soccer team got dethrottled Friday afternoon with Victory Christian Academy taking a 3-1 Class 1A state semifinal win over the Spartans' defense of their Class 1A state title and a possible 16th state title for the program. Victory, 14-8-0, would finish as Class 1A runner-up with a 1-0 loss to Canterbury in the championship game. St. Johns, the top seed of the tournament, finished at 15-4-3.

With the Spartans scoring first, Adisienne Taylor at 29:01 of the first half, the St. Johns attack seemed to be in normal go mode with a swift movement of the ball on the Victory side of the midfield stripe for most of the first 20 minutes.
Top scorer Victoria Sarka, 32 goals with four hat tricks in the last five games, had her first breakaway literally off the initial kickoff of the game, but failed to finish the run.

Moments later, Calli Berrang had a soft shot on goal that came in what looked like a Spartans rapid fire opening salvo.

Lizzie Nowicki wrapped a shot off another breakaway, but Victory goalie Chiara Domico was on point early and for the entire game with eight saves registered amidst 13 missed corner kick plays for the Spartans. Domico seemed ahead of the normally potent Spartan corner kick set plays with a quick leap over the heads of Sarka and Berrang prior to Alana Mantello's accurate corner kicks.

St. Johns' first corner kick came only at 30:34 but got a throw in follow up after a scramble in front of the net. The throw in proved fruitful with Taylor snagging the loose ball and punching in the first goal of the game at 29:01.

St. Johns got a string of corner kicks after that initial goal, but the results were misses and a rare errant Mantello kick with Victory getting their initial shot on goal with 11 minutes to go in the half with a second one moments later that seemed to get stuck in front of Spartan goalie Alyvia Bishop before being cleared.
Victory created their own offense surge after the five-minute mark, with Bishop in position to end the half at 1-0.

St. Johns opened the second half with a barrage of corner kicks, up to their 11th for the game to the 31-minute mark with no success.

Victory took advantage of the Spartans' move to crowd the goal with a breakaway goal from freshman Kinley Hunter at the 29:12 mark of the second half to tie the game 1-1. The goal was just the eighth of the year for Hunter.
Victory continued to press the Spartan defense with an effort to find seventh grade phenom Olivia Enechukwu (12 goals), who seemed to find the seams in the normally tight Spartan front.

At 11:38, Hunter and Enechukwu combined to move the ball swiftly into Spartan territory with Hunter again breaking free for her second goal for a 2-1 lead.
A 12th Spartan corner kick followed that created a scrum in front of Damico who wrestled the ball away to safety amidst a flurry of shot attempts.

In the final four minutes, with St. Johns forced to play hurry up ball with Berrang and Sarka both blasting near misses at Domico, Victory got their final goal on another break, this one from Enechukwu who put in the insurance goal with just 55 seconds left in the game.