Five straight titles

The Patriots were one win away from securing yet another conference championship.

They jumped out to a 6-2 lead at half against the Starfires on Sept. 3, only to have weather force the game to be postponed.

More than two weeks later, the Patriot dominance continued.

Jay County High School’s girls soccer team hung on to its lead from earlier this month to finish off the South Adams Starfires in one half of play Wednesday to get a 7-3 victory and claim the program’s fifth consecutive Allen County Athletic Conference championship.

“It definitely means a lot,” said JCHS senior Mikele Suman, who is in her fourth season starting for the Patriots. “It’s something that keeps me thriving throughout the season.”

It marked the 16th consecutive win against conference opponents for the Patriots (5-2, 3-0 ACAC).

“I think it’s good,” JCHS coach Renae Laux said of what the streak means for the program. “I’m proud of the girls for continuing to work through that.”

The last time Jay County lost to a conference opponent was Sept. 9, 2014, in a 7-1 setback Leo during its last year as an ACAC member.

“Being the top dog isn’t always easy,” Laux added. “You kind of have that mental piece of you want it bad, but everybody else really wants it.

“They want to dethrone you. They want to knock you down.”

Already in a 6-2 hole to begin Wednesday’s second half, South Adams (7-3, 1-1 ACAC)) played with the same resiliency it had two weeks prior, but Jay County still had control of most of the offensive chances. The Patriots had a 4-1 advantage in corner kicks but weren’t able to convert any of them.

The Starfires, who had won five straight games between halves against the Patriots, trimmed the margin to 6-3 on a Madi Smith goal on a penalty kick. Smith buried the PK to the left side of the net past JCHS goalkeeper Tricia Ison with 15:39 left on the clock.

Eight minutes later, Eliza Bader of Jay County pushed the margin back to four goals as she crashed on a loose ball in the box and beat SAHS keeper Jenna Myers.

Jay County faced a different situation entering Wednesday’s game with a four-goal lead. Laux said the biggest thing heading into the contest was keeping her squad mentally ready to play even though it had the cushion it did.

“Understanding that yes, it is 6-2, but we’re telling them start zero-zero,” she said. “Play with full effort but also understanding it’s 6-2. Time management and those types of things come into play as well.

“That’s a lot of what we talked about before the game, that it was going to be very mental and we needed to come out and show some leadership, just work hard.”

Suman offered a different perspective of how the Patriots approached the night.

“Usually our team, we’re a second-half team so we definitely had to stay focused and hype each other up,” she said. “Talk about what it would mean to us if we would win and why we were trying to win this.”

Jay County’s lead on Sept. 3 was due in part to another solid outing from freshman Gabi Bilbrey. The youngster scored three goals, including two in the span of 125 seconds, on her way to her second career hat trick.

Mackynzie Fairchild notched her second goal of the season on an assist from Mara Bader to make it 2-0 Jay County before Macie Hirschy had a booming kick from about 30 yards out to pull South Adams within one, 2-1.

Mara Bader scored to put the Patriots out front, 3-1, but Ali Smith of South Adams answered, trimming the margin to 3-2.

Payton McCoy scored to make it 4-2, and Bilbrey completed her hat trick by hitting twine with 2:42 to play and again with 37 seconds remaining.