Signal Mountain has set the standard for Tennessee Class A high school girls' soccer for the second year in a row.
The Lady Eagles steamrolled their way in Murfreesboro to the prestigious plaque, which was hoisted after a 4-1 victory over Alcoa in Saturday's championship match on turf at Page High School.
Outshooting its opposition 51-15 and finishing with a 12-1 goal advantage, which included shutouts over Madison Magnet and Cosby, Signal Mountain repeated its dominance to secure the 23rd overall state championship in school history.
"We came up here focused on doing the job we needed to," coach Richard Northcutt said. "Once the final whistle blew, it sunk in that we won again. Winning state is a challenging thing to do. So many things can go wrong and people can get hurt. But this whole week a lot of our play went towards our opponents' goal. We really passed excellent, and everyone did their part."
The Lady Eagles (16-7) shared the ball well and made the extra passes to set up higher percentage shots, especially in the last two matches as they outshot Cosby and Alcoa 40-6.
Junior star Camilla Mincey assisted or scored a goal in the first nine minutes in all three matches, while she raised her final tally to 32 goals on the season. The Chattanooga area's top scorer netted her second goal in the 55th minute of Saturday's final for a 4-0 lead.
Basically untouchable in the postseason, the Lady Eagles had a bleak early season as injuries mounted while they lost six of their first eight games. Signal Mountain won its final 12 matches and 14 of its last 15. Northcutt's team scored 41 goals in the regular season before erupting for 51 in eight postseason matches.
"Things looked grim for us early," Northcutt said. "We were getting mercy-ruled, but we kept hope we would have everybody back for our postseason run. We knew we wouldn't be playing Maryville or some of those really tough teams we played down several players. Once we got everyone back and returned to our level of competition, I thought we had a real opportunity."
Senior Kennedy Ethridge and junior goalkeeper Reilly Furr battled back from injuries to play major roles in the state tournament. Ethridge scored three goals on 13 shots and assisted on a score, while Furr made two saves in each match. Mincey finished with three goals and four assists.
Sophomores Kara Wilson and Virginia Whitney each added two goals in the state tournament. Both scored in the final as the Lady Eagles paid Alcoa (14-6) back after losing to the Lady Tornadoes for the state title in 2017.
Signal Mountain will lose just four seniors, including standout midfielder Lucy Calhoun, and looks capable of continuing to set the bar for Class A in the future.
Contact Patrick MacCoon at pmaccoon@timesfreepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @PMacCoon.