SACRAMENTO, Calif. – Seniors Brooke Harmon and Yasmin Azar combined for a transition goal in the 54th minute while senior goalkeeper Angelina Delaini posted five saves en route to her fifth straight shutout, as St. Francis captured the CIF NorCal Region Division II championship with a 1-0 win over Granite Bay in postseason girls' soccer action at Jesuit's Marauder Stadium Saturday.
The Troubadours finish the season with a 23-4-3 overall record, tying the 2019 and 2020 squads for the most wins in the MaxPreps era of record-keeping. Not coincidentally, the 2019 SF squad was the previous team to win a NorCal title while the 2020 team had been the last to capture a Sac-Joaquin Section banner. Thus, the 2024 Troubie squad is the first to snare both section and region crowns.
The lone goal of the game began and ended with Azar. The Coastal Carolina commit gained possession in the Troubie backfield, then sent the ball wide to Caitlin Hafenstein. Hafenstein then played up to Harmon, who delivered a one-touch pass back to Azar, who went straight to the GB cage and calmly pushed her shot into the lower right corner past Grizzly keeper Piper Brown.
That score held up for the rest of the game, although not without several Grizzly opportunities. With strong wind gusts and a heavy drizzle persisting throughout the game, a ball slipped through Delaini's gloves along the left edge of the penalty box in the 60th minute. GB's Cailee Krouse raced to the ball, put had a tough angle on a shot and no nearby teammate to whom to send a cross. Krouse's shot missed left, glancing harmlessly off the side of the net.
The Grizzlies' Ella Griffin nearly equalized in the 78th, moving past Giada Pagano on the left side and getting a strike on frame. But a diving save for Delaini resulted in a Granite Bay corner kick. Azar cleared the ball out before the Grizzlies could get any further chances. Griffin also managed one final shot in the four minutes of stoppage time, again resulting in a Delaini block.
The 2024 regional was the first St. Francis appearance as the No. 1 seed. The Troubies blanked Casa Grande on Tuesday (4-0) and Homestead on Thursday (2-0), both at American River College. In part due to the weather, Saturday's final moved to Jesuit.
