SANTA CLARA — Lynn Byun wasn’t even sure if she was trying to score.
St. Francis’ sophomore winger had the ball on the far side of the field, normally much too wide to attempt a shot. But not on Friday at Buck Shaw Field during the CCS Division I girls soccer championship game.
Initially attempting a cross, Byun’s shot from near the left touch line instead drifted toward the Archbishop Mitty goal, but it couldn’t possibly go in. Right?
The ball kept drifting ever closer on the wings of the afternoon breeze in Santa Clara and eventually met the hands of the Mitty goalkeeper. The high ball trickled through her hands and into the far side of the net, giving the top-seeded Lancers a 1-0 lead.
That was all St. Francis needed on a night where it dominated possession. The No. 2 Monarchs applied pressure late, but shots on goal were hard to come by all night.
Mitty continued to struggle to put the ball on frame during its late surge, and St. Francis held the line. When the final whistle rang out, the Lancers had won their 15th overall CCS girls soccer championship and third consecutive section title.
“I first was aiming for a cross,” Byun said afterward. “And then it somehow, like, did a little spin, and then it went inside. It was a good layoff (pass), and I think I just got a bit lucky. But a goal’s a goal.”
It definitely was on a night where scoring chances were hard to come by for both teams. Mitty goalkeeper Vivian Baker was the star of the first half, making multiple difficult, crucial saves to turn away St. Francis attackers.
But the Lancers kept at it in the second half, and they were rewarded with Byun’s unexpected goal.
“To be honest, it looked like a cross,” St. Francis coach Carlos Barboza said. “It looked like she wanted to put it in a dangerous area. So, no, leaving her foot, the first thought was not, ‘It’s going to be a goal.’”
But then again: “A goal is a goal,” Barboza added.
For Mitty, the disappointment of coming up short on the season’s biggest stage felt unpleasantly familiar. The Monarchs also lost to the Lancers in the 2024 CCS championship and 4-0 earlier this season during West Catholic Athletic League play in Mountain View.
They beat St. Francis 1-0 in the teams’ first regular-season meeting this year in San Jose, and they weren’t far off on Friday.
“It was a cumulative thing over the course of the night,” Mitty coach JT Hanley said. “I actually was not upset with the way we played. I thought we were super organized, and I thought we responded to the goal really, really well. But these games are always – last year’s was a one-goal thing. This year was a one-goal thing.
“I’m a little tired of coming out on the wrong side of it. They played a really good game, and they were organized, patient. But they really didn’t get a ton of good looks other than the one.”
Mitty could have yet another shot against St. Francis. The two teams matched up in 2024’s NorCal regional semifinal, where the Monarchs won 3-2.
But Friday was St. Francis’ day to celebrate what has become an annual tradition for the Lancers at the CCS title game.
“That’s just a super big accomplishment,” said Byun, who is in her first year on varsity. “Three times is like a lot, and we’re champions now again. That’s such an amazing thing for St. Francis and our St. Francis community.”
Hanley doesn’t like the way things turned out at Santa Clara, but he does greatly respect what the Lancers have accomplished as a program.
“Hats off to them,” Hanley said. “Three years in a row, that’s quite an accomplishment. We did it four years in a row, and I know how hard it is to even win back to back. So credit to them.”
