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SANDY — Herriman's boys soccer program has put together plenty of dominant teams, with two state title match appearances in the 12-year history of the program.
After the Mustangs' most recent regular season, this year's team probably wouldn't have been remembered among them, with a seven-game losing streak, a 5-8 record and a fifth-place finish in Region, to say nothing of the 18-seed they took into the 6A state tournament.
But it's not how you start; it's how you finish.
And Trevor Walk finishes pretty well.
The junior delivered a walk-off game winner for the ages with 2 seconds remaining, lifting the long-shot Mustangs to a 1-0 win over Davis to clinch the first state title in program history at Rio Tinto Stadium.
"No one remembers the score at halftime," Herriman coach Marcello Gasperini quipped after Walk's last-second heroics. "That's one that goes down in the books.
"I thought we were going to overtime, which we know very well. But it looks like today we could get it with a couple of seconds left. I'm screaming my guts out for them to shoot, and the one shot they shoot, it goes in. We'll bank on that all day."
With the countdown timer running low and the Darts (13-5) scurrying in front of goal, Walk took the ball from the top of the 18-yard box and lobbed a left-footed shot at the buzzer that sailed past the fingertips of Davis goalkeeper Jude Walker for the only goal — and win — that will matter this season for Herriman (10-8).
From 18-seed to state champs, the Mustangs have made history.
"It was just a desperation shot as the time was ticking down, and it happened to go in," Walk said. "It was crazy.
"I was screaming at our teammates to get the ball in to get one last shot. I took a touch, it went through the keeper's hand. It was pretty crazy."
The Mustangs were anything but world-beaters during the regular season, opening the season just 3-for-8 with five overtime losses. But after turning their fortunes around with a pair of wins over West Jordan and Riverton to end the regular season, something changed.
"I think we were just getting unlucky. We had a great team, we were playing good games; we just couldn't find that end product in the end," Walk said. "And once the playoffs came, our mentality was there. We were hungry for the wins.
"We started bonding a lot more, and having fun. We weren't so worried about the record, and we just started playing our game, getting along well, and just clicking. It happened to work for the playoffs."
Herriman was playing the same soccer, the same tactics and the same players. But the players just started to believe — and believe and believe, as they took down Westlake 2-1, upset No. 2 Corner Canyon on penalty kicks, held off fellow upstart West 2-1 in the quarterfinals. That set up a semifinal with sixth-seeded Farmington — a final four that featured teams Nos. 5, 6, 8 and 18 on the seed line — that ended 2-1 in the Mustangs' third-straight overtime game before Wednesday's final.
"I think a lot of us were ready for overtime, getting ready for the last minute," Walk said. "We had been in overtime the last three games in the playoffs, and that ended up happening.
"We didn't have to play any extra minutes."
The Mustangs had nothing to lose, at that point; if anything, a win was never expected, a double-digit seed with 18-to-1 odds — at best — to lift the trophy at the end of the season.
"We just came in with that underdog mentality," Walk said, "and we were able to get it done out there."
The Mustangs have had several incredible teams — a 2018 squad led by Deseret News Mr. Soccer Carter Johnson that finished 19-1 and lost to Pleasant Grove on penalty kicks in the championship perhaps chief amongst them. So was this team, the one with the seven-game losing streak and the sub-.500 regular season ever expected to break through for a program-first?
Hardly — at least, based on how they started.
But it's all in the finish. Ask Walk about that some time.
"I would have killed to play on this field at some point in time as a player," Gasperini said. "To be able to bring this one home as a first-year head coach, when there was so much doubt behind it, it's a memory of mine that will go up there with the birth of my kids and the marriage to my wife."
