St. Clairsville’s Bella Swan (2)fights off Beaver Local’s Jensen Britt (11) as the Red Devils’ Macy Malin (27) look on. The Red Devils and Beavers battled to a 1-all tie and therefore shared the Buckeye 8 championship.

ROGERS – St. Clairsville took a slightly conservative approach into the second half Tuesday during its Buckeye 8 title game against Beaver Local.

The Red Devils held a narrow 1-0 lead at the break and with the way their defense was playing, the strategy seemed sound.

It nearly paid off, save for one brief series of events with just under eight minutes to play in regulation.

Beaver sophomore Chansyn Hoppel worked the ball into the box and drew a penalty, giving senior co-captain Riley Britt a chance to even the score with a penalty kick.

Given it was the Beavers’ senior night, Britt was not going to disappoint. She rifled a shot low and just inside the right-side post.

The two teams continued to battle the final minutes, with neither able to tally the decisive goal as St. Clairsville and Beaver Local played to a 1-1 tie, both earning a share of the Buckeye 8 championship as a result.

“We had our wide mids playing a little more defensive,” St. Clairsville coach Wes Stoner said. They have some speed and skill up top and they like to play balls wide and then through.

“We also had a one goal lead so there wasn’t that sense of urgency to attack. I kind of wish we (attacked) a little bit more than we did.”

Stoner said it wasn’t a coaching decision to focus more on defense, but that his players had plenty of experience with how the host Beavers operate and they naturally moved to that positioning.

It worked for the most part. Keeper Jaeda Nowak finished with 14 saves, including a few diving stops in traffic in the second half. The back four of freshmen Jocelyhnn Zucco, Megan Malin, Gianna Nardo and junior Eliana Watt were stopping rushes and turning away shot opportunities left and right.

The Beavers were able to use their speed, but never managed to get that final pass to set up a quality shot.

“We struggled a bit tonight to find the back of the net and a lot of times getting that final pass in the offensive third,” Beaver Local coach Liz Conner said. “It’s something that we’re continuing to work on this year.

“But (Riley) came up big. She’s experienced taking penalty kicks for us.”

Roughly the same time period in the first half saw the game’s first goal tallied.

MiKayla Hendershot fielded the ball just across midfield and lofted a well-placed pass ahead that allowed Macy Malin to track it down. As she prepared to shoot, defender Jessica Eisenhart and Beavers’ keeper Hailey Russell closed in, with Russell diving toward Malin in attempt to thwart her shot.

Despite being sandwiched between the two, Malin found a way to eek the ball past and into the net with 7:14 remaining.

He way the Devils’ defense was playing, it seemed that might be enough.

“Again, our defense and Jaeda played excellent,” Stoner said. “We couldn’t be more pleased. I hate to bring up that they are freshman, but they are. And they still are playing really, really well for just their 10th game.”

In addition to deciding the Buckeye 8 champion, this game had the potential to decide the top seed for Class 4A for the OVAC Cup. St. Clairsville came in as the top seed, with Oak Glen just behind and Beaver third. Beaver, which is now 5-1-2 on the season, tied Oak Glen earlier.

Stoner thinks his team may hold the top seed come tourney, but if not, they’ll be second and will have to face Beaver again.

Russell finished with nine saves for Beaver.