Paul Fortmiller was at the right place at the right time. But just by a couple inches.
The Chattanooga Christian soccer player was just able to get a toe on a ball bouncing around the box in the final minutes of overtime in the team’s District 7-A/AA semifinal against Notre Dame, and he touched the ball past Irish keeper James Teal for the game-winner in a 1-0 victory, sending the Chargers (8-4-4) to the district final against Signal Mountain.
The Irish (7-8-2) outshot the Chargers 11-10 and were mere inches away from scoring in regulation when Esteban Lopez had a shot similar to Fortmiller’s that CCS’s Matt Hester made a sliding non-keeper save on. That was in the first half.
Notre Dame had a similar dangerous opportunity in the second half when Lopez created an opportunity for Christian Colvard, whose shot attempt just bounded wide of the goal.
“I thought we played pretty well,” Notre Dame coach Jim Schermerhorn said. “We had chances and I thought we played well enough to win, but we just couldn’t finish.”