photo by: Mike Hughes

Wheeling Park's Julia Dunaway fights for the ball with South's Mack Moles.

ST. CLAIRSVILLE — If Parkersburg South’s Emilee Owens wasn’t already considered one of the premier goalkeepers in the state of West Virginia, then Saturday’s performance against Wheeling Park should solidify her placement among those ranks.

Owens turned away 11 shots in keeping a clean sheet as the Wood County Patriots earned their first OVAC title since a three-peat between 2019-21 with a 3-0 win against Wheeling Park.

Simply put, Owens was brilliant in net.

“Their goalie was fantastic, no doubt about that,” lamented Wheeling Park head coach Tom Smith after watching his team fire 13 shots at Owens with no luck, with two rimming off the crossbar.

“She made some ridiculous saves.”

Owens first of many impressive stops came in the first half with her team leading 1-0.

Park’s Brenna Tipton lofted a hard-hit, high-arcing shot from the right side that looked like it would sneak it just under the crossbar. Owens alertly shot upward with hands outstretched to tip the ball over and out of danger.

Park had a prime scoring chance near the midway point of the second half, when leading scorer Julia Dunaway placed a ball just ahead of Katelyn Smith, who raced away to attempt a shot.

Owens watched the play develop and came sprinting out of the net, placing her body in harm’s way to block the ball and prevent Smith from scoring.

When she needed to charge, she did. When a big save was needed, Owens came through. Her effort certainly wasn’t lost on her head coach.

“We’re fortunate we have an outstanding goalkeeper,” Parkersburg South’s Ron Bucholtz said. “She did make some very nice saves.

South’s defense in front of Owens was also solid, and PSHS took a defensive posture with their game plan throughout most of the match.

The fact Park managed to get off 13 shots at Owens is a testament to its forwards and midfield, and the team’s aggressive style of play.

“They are a quality team with a strong midfield and Dunaway and Smith, those two are lighting up the nets,” Bucholtz said. “They will generate a lot of changes because of their high pressure, aggressive style of offense.

“You plan for that and design a defensive strategy, not parking the bus, but sometimes, that’s what it looked like.”

South’s defensive strategy didn’t afford its attackers many opportunities to shoot at Wheeling Park keeper Riley Perry.

But when they did, South struck true.

Regan Shockey got the ball rolling when she lifted a well-placed shot from the right side over Perry’s outstretched arms for a 1-0 reading.

Roughly nine minutes later, South struck again. This time, Shockey set up teammate Livy Henderson, who shot to the right of Perry. The Park keeper was out of position because of a deflection on a previous shot and couldn’t scramble in time to catch up with Henderson’s attempt.

That’s the way the score remained until Mack Moles obtained possession in a scrum-like congestion in front of the net and booted one past Perry for the final score.

That came with 9:42 remaining.

“Parkersburg South definitely deserved to win,” Coach Smith said. “They outplayed us. We just didn’t have it. I don’t know what was going on, but we were slow to react, slow to move, and when you play like that against a quality team, you are going to get burned.”

South improved to 12-0-3 with a home date against Washington High from the eastern panhandle set for Friday. Park, meanwhile, will look to bounce back Wednesday against Linsly.