DALTON, Ga. — The smile on Pedro Almazan’s face and the ovation he and his Southeast Whitfield soccer teammates received said more about Friday night’s outcome than the scoreboard did.

A hard-fought 90 minutes in the Georgia Class AAAA title match couldn’t produce a goal or a state champion, leaving the host Raiders to face Lakeside-DeKalb’s 6-foot-4 keeper Alec Kann in a penalty-kick shootout. The Furman University signee’s three saves kept Southeast Whitfield from its first-ever state title, but that didn’t stop more than 3,000 Raiders fans from showing their appreciation for the effort their team gave.

“We played our hearts out,” Almazan said. “I can’t explain it because I don’t have the words to right now, but we gave it our all. It’s something really beautiful that we accomplished. We worked hard for this. We worked hard to get here, and we got this community to come together and support us.”

The four busloads of students who arrived to cheer on Lakeside-DeKalb pushed Friday’s attendance closer to 4,000, and those fans saw several dangerous scoring chances in the first period. Southeast Whitfield defenders twice cleared away Vikings shots that came close to the line, and two others sailed over the net.

Staff Photo by Gillian Bolsover- Southeast Whitfield’s Juan Rosio fights for possession of the ball between Lakeside High School’s Alec Kann, left, and Drew Roach Friday at Southeast Whitfield High School. Lakeside won during a penalty shootout 3-1 to take the AAAA state championship.

The Raiders (18-3) put together a few opportunities of their own, but most of their first-half shots went right to Lakeside’s Jonathan Arroqui, who tended the net until Kann came to the line for the shootout. In the 53rd minute, Southeast finally got a ball behind him, but a Vikings defender cleared a high bounce that was headed inside the net.

As time wound down and the pressure built, so did the Raiders’ attack. They controlled most of the play in the final 20 minutes, with another shot headed out by the Lakeside defense and one more chance in the final 20 seconds, but regulation ended in deadlock.

“We had a lot of momentum,” Southeast coach Jamison Griffin said. “We made a couple of adjustments at halftime which gave us a lot of good looks. There were a couple of times when I really thought we were going to get one, but it just didn’t happen.”

The Vikings (20-1-1) had a shot just wide in the final minute of the first five-minute extra period and several chances off throw-ins in the second, but neither team could connect in overtime.

Southeast had advanced with a shootout win in the quarterfinals, but Friday marked the fifth time this season that Lakeside had gone to penalty kicks. Coach Rick Barbe again made the switch to allow Kann, a state and regional ODP player, to move from the field to the goal.

“He’s done it five times,” Barbe said. “He has a lot of confidence, and the team has a lot of confidence in him, but to do it in a pressure situation like this, with so many people here and so much on the line, just really proves why he’s a Division I player.”

The Raiders got their first kick past Kann, and their fans erupted when keeper Jesus Serna saved Lakeside’s second shot. Kann followed that with his first stop, and two more sealed a 3-1 edge for the Vikings.

“I thought my keeper made a great stop, and usually in penalties that would be enough to win the game,” Griffin said. “But there’s a difference between winning and claiming victory, and we claimed victory tonight.”

Even as the Vikings celebrated their win, Southeast fans were leaving the stands to congratulate the Raiders on a season that included their first region title and first trip to a state final.

“I feel like we won the game,” Griffin said. “When you play like we did, you have no regrets. We did everything right, and they did everything right. That’s why you have overtime. For it to come down to penalties is a victory in my opinion.”

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