Olathe United Wins 3-1 To Take Home The Select League Championship

Olathe United won their 15th game of the season with a hard-fought 3-1 victory over Northland to bring home The Select League title Saturday night. Northland got on the scorebooard first in the 13th minute when a shot from outside the box was mishandled by the Olathe United goal keeper giving the visitors their one goal cushion. It would stay 1-0 until the 58th minute when right-winger, Shadrach Jaeger had a ball poked to him from mid-fielder, Max Leiker on the right side of the box. Jaeger took a touch toward the endline and rocketed a shot from a difficult angle that hit the inside of the far post and caromed into the goal to tie the game. Olathe kept pushing for that winning goal and it finally came in the 86th minute when defender Ryan Lytton sent in a corner kick that midfielder Andrew Porter perfectly headed down and into the back of the net. Olathe scored their final goal in stoppage time when Porter sent a long goal kick that winger Ethan Bowman was able to flick onto himself and beat his defender to the box, cutting back onto his right foot and finishing into the lower left corner to complete the 3-1 victory.

After the game, we caught up with Coach Todd Esh: "I am extremely happy for these boys and the work they put in tonight, and all season. We knew tonight would be tough as we only had 1 sub who was already injured and we had one of our goalies playing in the field. It was a hot night and these boys did a lot of running. It is a long season and we got contributions from everyone this year in one way, shape, or form. I told (goalie) Shadrach that he was going to score a banger for us tonight and his goal was a beauty and it really got us back into the game. This team has proven they can play with the lead as well as come from behind. I am very proud of them and I am looking forward to our final 2 games as our goal is to remain unbeaten. Select League and Kansas State Cup Champions has a nice ring to it."