Bad bounces cost Stillwater girls' soccer in Class C state final

Stillwater girls' soccer coach Christine Ihnatolya embraces freshman midfielder Kennedie Van Pelt (2) during the awards ceremony following the NYSPHSAA Class C championship game on Sunday, Nov. 15, 2026 at Dryden High School. (Adam Shinder/Times Union) DRYDEN - The Stillwater girls' soccer team's stubborn defense did its job for more than 50 minutes in Sunday's NYSPHSAA Class C final against Wilson, but two bad bounces a minute apart spelled the end of the program's hopes for back-to-back state titles.Those two bad bounces both resulted in Wilson goals - one by Lilly Gurski, one by Zoey Beck - and Stillwater was unable to get back on the front foot, ultimately falling 3-0 at Dryden High School.Stillwater (19-3 overall) coach Christine Ihnatolya was determined not to let the result cloud a season that saw her team - which included six freshmen and just three seniors on its roster - play on championship Sunday for the third consecutive season."They have to look at where they are from the beginning of the season and where we ended up at the end of the season," Ihnatolya said. "We've grown together every single step of the way, and we have so much to be proud of."Stillwater senior Brooke Hodgson, who scored the winning goal in last year's state championship game, was emotional in the aftermath of the final game of her high school soccer career."Results really don't show how much effort we put into that game," Hodgson said. "I'm actually so proud of this team."Wilson (21-0), the state's top-ranked Class C team, provided a difficult task for Stillwater to deal with from the opening minute. The Lakewomen possessed a significant size advantage that allowed them to command both ends of the field.Despite that, Stillwater's defense - which entered Sunday having allowed just nine goals all season and three over its previous 14 games - held firm behind solid goalkeeping from senior Addison Thornton until the decisive stretch started in the 52nd minute.First, a speculative left-footed shot by Wilson's Lilly Gurski was initially trapped by Thornton, but the ball squirted away as she attempted to cover it up and it rolled into the goal. Less than a minute later, Beck's free kick over the top from just inside the midfield line took a hop and bounced over Thornton's outstretched arms to make it 2-0."Everyone's going to make mistakes," Ihnatolya said. "If it weren't for her, we wouldn't be here, so she can't hang her head on this game at all because she's come up big in some really big situations for us."The sudden two-goal deficit stunned a Stillwater team that had produced some of its best attacking moments of the game in the first 10 minutes of the second half."They're a really big team," Hodgson said of Wilson. "It was just hard to play how we normally play, and that's really that."Wilson iced the game when Beck headed in a Gurski corner kick with 4:49 to play.Despite the loss, there's plenty of optimism for Stillwater moving forward. Hodgson, Thornton and Madelyn Callanan are set to be the only losses to graduation, and the starting lineup is full of players who have experience being part of at least one of the program's current three-year run of state final appearances."Hopefully, (this loss) is a driving force," Ihnatolya said. "We've been in this situation where we've lost and we've come back again and gotten the result that we wanted.""I know," Hodgson said, "they'll be right back here next year."SubscribeThere’s more to Albany with the Times Union. Subscribe today for just 25¢.This article originally published at Bad bounces cost Stillwater girls' soccer in Class C state final.