The Cascade Champions went on the road to Chapel Hill and beat the Forrest Rockets, 3-2, to win the District 9-A Championship on Friday night.

This marks the fourth time in the last five seasons dating back to 2019 that Cascade has won the district tournament title with the lone exception being 2023 when they lost to Community in the semi-finals. 

In both of the previous meetings between the two sides, the winning team scored five goals. Back on March 14th, Chapel Hill beat Cascade at home, 5-4, before Cascade returned home a month later for the return match and won, 5-3. In terms of excitement, the third meeting did not disappoint.

The scoring began early for the Champs with Jason Chanmavong, who got the start after coming off the bench in the semi-final, slotting an Ivan Draine pass into the net just three minutes into the game for his third goal of the season.

Chapel Hill would settle down afterwards, and as the half progressed, they found their way onto the scoreboard in the 19th minute with Gavin Grissom scoring his team-high 9th goal of the season to tie the game at 1-1. 

As the first half clock ticked on, Cascade began pushing for a second. They found it eight minutes after the Rockets’ tying goal in the 29th minute with senior star Ivan Draine. Draine, with an assist from forward Williamson Cook, poked home his team-high 11th goal of the season to give the Champs a 2-1 lead going into halftime. 

Ivan Draine (2) scored a goal and assisted on two others on Friday.

To start the second half, Chapel Hill started increasing the pressure on the Cascade goal, and after 15 minutes they found a second equalizer with senior Matheus Bretanha scoring his 7th goal of the season in the 55th minute to give the hometown Rockets new life yet again.

However, the mettle and senior leadership of the Champs shone through yet again as they worked to find the winning goal. Despite losing a one-goal lead twice already on the road, Cascade continued to push forward, finally finding that game-winning goal with just ten minutes to go. 

In the 70th minute, Draine released one of his patented long throw-ins. Cook, with an assist already to Draine, pounced in the box, finding a way to put the ball in the back of the net and putting Cascade back in front for the third and final time. 

With a 3-2 lead in the final ten minutes, the Champs fought off one final Rockets’ attacking wave. Chapel Hill had two corners and a free kick in the attacking third, but the Cascade backline led by Hayden Dowell, and goalkeeper Nick Harris, kept the Rockets off the board in the final frenetic minutes to seal yet another district title. 

Draine finished with one goal and two assists, coming through for the Champs in the biggest moment of the season.

Chapel Hill falls to 7-4 (5-1) and will travel to Loretto on Monday.

Cascade improves to 8-3-1 (4-1-1) and are set to host Richland in the first round of the Region 5-A Tournament on Monday night.