ONEONTA –– The Tully boys soccer team has rallied around its longtime head coach, Bill Donald, to make the first state semifinal in school history. The Black Knights are making Donald sweat for it, but the Section III champs beat Section IV champion Southern Cayuga 2-1 in double overtime to move to the Class C state semifinals.
“It feels amazing,” junior Julian Shay said. “You can just tell on Coach Donald’s look, that he’s just so thrilled and he’s so happy. That just makes all of us thrilled because we made him proud. I think that’s what matters at the end of the day. He deserves it and so do we.”
Donald is in his 22nd season heading the Tully program and has served as the Section III Boys Soccer Chairman for a while. He usually goes to the state final four to represent his section, this time he’s going as a coach.
“It means a ton because we started talking about this when they were in fifth grade, that we were going to the state championship in fifth grade,” Donald said. “They were my ball boys. Their brothers had played for me. It means the world to me that this is the group that we’re taking for the first time. They earn it every day in practice.”
Shay has been the hero for Tully all season –– when he’s not hurt –– and did so again Saturday. He seems to score every big goal for the Black Knights and buried the game-winning goal 2:56 into double overtime to keep his season going.
“I’ve started to realize that I keep scoring these winning goals,” Shay said. “I’m so thrilled about it. A lot of it doesn’t even come from me. Ryan (Rauber) did a great job on the end line and got a cross off, I was just there to finish it. It’s just about being in the right place and the right time.”
Rauber took a corner kick and the ball came out of the box back to him. He took two touches toward the end line and crossed it right to Shay’s foot with the ball hovering over the end line.
Shay also struck early for the Black Knights and they seemed in complete control the entire first half. He buried the game’s first goal 12 minutes in off a pass from Sean Mize.
The two teams went at it all game, with bodies colliding constantly. Southern Cayuga was called for two yellow cards in the second half and Tully’s Wes Chambala was shown one in the first overtime.
Tully’s defense had to put up with constant contact whenever the Chiefs were starting to build offensively, and senior Andy Polak felt that got tiring after a while.
“I got pretty used to that over the season, but it was definitely tough,” Polak said. “In the second half and overtime, it was definitely starting to build up.”
Tully dealt with the physicality well in the first half, but dropped its level slightly to start the second half. Southern Cayuga capitalized, evening the score 3:25 into the half on a Ben Kermidas strike.
“We were outplaying them in the first half, then we came out a little soft in the second half,” Shay said. “They took advantage of that. After they scored, we popped our heads back up and we knew we could play around them so easily. We had so many chances we couldn’t capitalize on.”
“I think we had to play really hard,” Donald added. “The game was very physically hard. Some of the kids struggled with it and some of them got better. We just dug in and worked hard and finally finished an opportunity.”
The Tully community has been behind this team from the start and showed out in Oneonta Saturday. The school bused a lot of students out to support their classmates and the Black Knight faithful were rocking the entire game.
“It would’ve been a good time to break into houses in Tully, that’s for sure,” Donald said. “It’s great to have the parents around, the community, seeing alumni and seeing people that just love Tully. Small towns are the best way to go.”
Tully will continue its best run ever with a Class C state semifinal at 3 p.m. Friday at Middletown High School against Section VI champion Allegheny-Limestone (17-2). Allegheny-Limestone beat Section V champion Kendall 4-2 Saturday.
