Douglas Miles

Your Prep Sports

DES MOINES – Brad Stiles chose one word for his team’s state semifinal match.

‘Believe.’

And considering the amount of time the West High boys’ soccer team spent on the wrong end of the scoreboard Thursday, it needed to heed its coach’s watchword.

“A lot of these guys hadn’t been in this situation before in a state tournament,” Stiles said after the top-seeded Trojans rallied with two goals in the final 16 minutes and upended No. 4 West Des Moines Valley, 3-2, in thrilling fashion. “And I could tell there were a lot of nerves and a lot of, maybe doubt, in their minds. But hopefully I changed their mind a little bit.”

Sophomore reserve forward Amre Ibrahim was the unlikely hero in the West High comeback.

His toe-poke goal amidst a scrum in the 68th minute broke a 2-2 deadlock and gave the Trojans the lead for good.

Remarkably, it was the first goal of his varsity career.

“It felt like a dream,” Ibrahim said. “That felt really good. I came up as a sub with my first goal, first time varsity. It felt amazing scoring that.”

Things appeared relatively easy early on for West High (20-1) after senior forward Marko Migambi got the scoring started with a goal in the 10th minute, his seventh this season.

But from there, West Des Moines Valley seized momentum with a dizzying array of free kicks and corner kicks that put two goals on the scoreboard in an eight-minute span midway through the first half and continually threatened to add to it.

“I think Valley attacked the ball way better than we did today,” Stiles said. “And it showed in front of the goal.”

Valley (17-5) maintained its 2-1 lead for 27 minutes of clock time, but were held scoreless for the final 51 minutes.

“At the beginning we were maybe a little nervous,” West High senior Kolby Godbolt said. “Just a lot of emotions going on at the end of a semifinal game. You go home if you lose. In the second half, we all just kind of calmed down and took a deep breath and we started playing soccer like we know how to.”

With the Valley offensive chances drying up, Godbolt began to affect the offensive action for the Trojans.

After Valley goalkeeper Adrik Feitelson denied a West High scoring opportunity by sliding to meet the ball at Godbolt’s foot, a second Godbolt shot struck the post.

Just when it appeared as if it might not be West High’s day, Godbolt broke through with the tying goal in the 64th minute off an assist from sophomore Michael Nelson.

“I saw the ball coming across and I knew the dude was right on me,” said Godbolt, who began his prep career at Iowa City Liberty and now has five goals in two tournament games with West. “So I just opened my body and I just hit it and luckily it went in.”

The equalizer gave West High new life, the bench exploded in jubilation and Godbolt implored his teammates to further its newfound momentum.

“That really pumped me up,” Godbolt said. “I think it gave us an extra energy boost that we needed to push the game through.”

It took less than four minutes for Ibrahim and West High to reclaim the lead for good and stamp its spot in the state championship match for the third time in four seasons and 14th time overall.

The victory is the 18th in a row for the Trojans (20-1), which will play for a state-record 10th state championship on Saturday at 5 p.m. against No. 6 Pleasant Valley (19-3).

“Sleep and rest,” Stiles said of his message to the team between now and Saturday. “If I haven’t fixed it by now, we are not going to fix it in a day and a half. We just need our legs under us and stay focused for another 48 hours.”

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