Harrison boys soccer outlasts McCutcheon in overtime to reach 3A sectional final

Reader's note: the story has been adjusted to reflect Boyd Wheeler as the McCutcheon head coach.

WEST LAFAYETTE — Harrison and McCutcheon were gridlocked after 80 minutes of regulation in another physical saga between the two rival boys soccer programs.

With a trip to the Class 3A IHSAA sectional championship hanging in the balance, Harrison knew it needed to produce a goal in a way McCutcheon hadn't schemed for. Doing so while senior McCutcheon goalkeeper William "Kaleb" Fultz had been nearly impregnable.

Defender Evan Pounds pitched a plan at halftime to lead him to fire a throw-in towards the goal if the distance was both close enough but far enough away for McCutcheon to least expect it.

"I was telling the guys that after my first throw in that I could get it to the other side of the box," Pounds said.

Pounds fired a throw-in that intersected with an unmarked Ashton Avila, who headed in past Fultz in the 81st minute, the go-ahead goal proving enough for Harrison to outlast McCutcheon 2-1 in overtime.

The win advanced Harrison (14-0-4) to the sectional championship, where it'll play Lafayette Jeff on Saturday at 7 p.m. The Raiders have won 16 sectional championships including three straight dating back to 2021.

"We just work as a team and when the team needs me, I'm there to finish," Avila said.

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McCutcheon (14-4) was led by Fultz who ended his high school career with his best performance as a netminder. Fultz finished with 12 saves and included a three-save barrage in the 22nd minute to keep the score knotted 0-0.

"I just came into this game knowing that this will be the best game I'll ever play," Fultz said. "It could potentially be my last and I didn't want it to be my last. My mindset was I'm going to play the best game of my life and I think I did that."

A noteworthy performance for Fultz who didn't play goalkeeper until this season. He had previously been a forward during his last three years. But he was asked by head coach Boyd Wheeler to shift roles.

Fultz explained how he became more resilient after accepting his new role.

"In past years I tended to get down on myself and this year everyone brought me up and made me a more positive person," Fultz said. "That helped the team chemistry a lot especially when we went through the tough times we just were in."

It took Fultz being outnumbered in the box for Harrison to score its first shot. Senior Carter Koutsouros scored on a save deflection by Fultz to give Harrison the lead 1-0 in the 28th minute.

Senior Edgar Garcia tied the match for McCutcheon by catching sophomore Timmy Schneider out of the box in the 41st minute.

McCutcheon made the match physical with aggressive marking and pressure. Harrison junior leading goal scorer Ivan Gutierrez was held scoreless and a trickle of frustration began settling in with Harrison in the second half.

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"(Fultz) has really grown this season and I'm proud of him," Wheeler said. "That was a heck of a game and to no fault of his own, there were a couple of times as a team that we needed to keep them off of him. For him to be there and to make all those saves obviously kept us in the game and gave us a great opportunity to still try and win this thing."

The Mavericks ended the season with 14 wins. Their four losses all came against ranked programs, three of the four being decided by just one goal.

"The kids have come together," Wheeler said. "The seniors I'm proud of them and everyone is working together. There was a lot of team mentality as opposed to an individual mentality even though we had Nery (Pacheco) score a ton of goals for us. Everyone was still working together. It didn't matter where the pass or shot came from, everyone was working together."

Ethan Hanson is the sports reporter for the Journal & Courier in Lafayette. He can be reached at ehanson@jconline.com , on Twitter at EthanAHanson and Instagram at ethan_a_hanson .

This article originally appeared on Lafayette Journal & Courier: Harrison boys soccer outlasts McCutcheon in overtime to reach 3A sectional final