MACON -- Parkview’s Austin Lu stopped back-to-back penalty kicks, capping a huge performance for the senior keeper in a 1-0 win (4-1) over Milton on Friday in a thrilling Class AAAAAA state championship game at Mercer University's Anderson Field.
Lu was brilliant during regulation and overtime. Time after time, he came up with diving and leaping saves to stop quality shots by Milton. He was even better during penalty kicks, stoning two of the first three attempts by the Eagles.
“We won the state championship,” Lu said. “And there’s not a better feeling than that.”
Natneal McDonald, Dylan Gaither, Andrei Bajura and Alessandro Castro converted on penalty kicks to give Parkview its seventh state soccer title.
It’s the Panthers' first championship since 2005 and their first under new coach Daniel Klinect. Just last year, Klinect, as then coach of rival Brookwood, stood on the pitch at Mercer University after losing the state championship game to Duluth. He left Brookwood for Parkview after that loss and found himself back in the same spot on Friday, this time as the champion.
“This is what it is all about,” Klinect said. “This is why I came to Parkview for this reason right here.”
Milton played extremely well. The Eagles outshot Parkview 11-7, and star keeper Ethan Suda practically matched Lu save for save. Senior forward Jan Zaragosa twice fired bending balls off of free kicks from just inside the 20-yard line that were right on target, but Lu was able to just get a hand on both to send them over the cross bar. Zaragosa again took aim right before the end of the first overtime, forcing Lu to dive to his right to make the save and send the game into a second overtime.
“This was the best Milton team I’ve had,” Eagles coach Dr. Michael Nova said.
Lu said he was well prepared by Klinect for the penalty kicks and almost knew what was coming.
"Coach K, every single game, he scouts PKs just in case," Lu said. "And this time we went to PKs and every spot was right. It just helped us win."
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