Gallery by Heather Belcher
Beckley – When Beckley beat Greenbrier East in the regular season Coby Dillon found the net twice and Ali Farghaly once.
Those two again terrorized East in the Spartans’ season finale.
Dillon scored on a corner kick in the 36th minute and Farghaly added cushion with a pair of goals in the second half as Beckley clinched the Class AAA Region 3, Section 2 championship Thursday evening at the Paul Cline Youth Sports Memorial Complex in Beckley.
The victory sends Beckley to the Class AAA Region 3 championship where it will face George Washington on Tuesday night with a spot in the state tournament on the line.
For the Flying Eagles success was sparked by their deadly corner kick game. After going 1-for-8 on corner opportunities in a 4-0 win over Oak Hill on Tuesday, the hosts finished 1-for-4 on Thursday with their second attempt yielding Dillon’s goal.
“We definitely talked about the corners yesterday, and it’s not a bad thing that everybody’s goal hungry,” Beckley head coach Steve Laraba said. “And you know, we talk about not drifting to the ball, but making the run you’re supposed to make. And they did that a lot better tonight because even if you’re not getting the ball, you’re pulling a defender, or you’re running a defender into his own player and somebody else is opening up and things like that. So I thought we did a much better job with that.”
Dillon’s goal came on a night where the Beckley offensive assault was furious. The Flying Eagles managed 10 shots on goal, playing most of the contest in East’s defensive third of the field.
“We’re pretty stingy with what we call shot on goal,” Laraba said. “So if we have 10 or 11, then that’s a really, really good night. First of all just give credit to (Greenbrier Eats head coach) Lucas (Lemine) and his coaching staff and Greenbrier East. They didn’t pull any tricks or anything. They’re like, ‘We’re just gonna go out and play them head to head.’ And they created a couple problems for us in the first half, trying to figure out how we’re going to deal with what they were attempting on their counter attack.”
The dam broke in the second half where Farghaly scored in the 45th and 62nd minute to ice the game, both assisted on by Hagen Hall who finished with assists on all three goals.
“They got behind the line a lot,” Lemine said of Dillon and Farghaly. “And again, like said, they got some good space. I think we dove in quite a bit, giving them that kind of space. And again, when we can’t keep the ball, it makes life difficult. So with the athletes, both of them are great athletes. Farghaly, he’s phenomenal on the ball, and I think he’s just sophomore. I mean, he’s ridiculous on the ball. So yeah, he’s a great player.”
“I don’t know what it is, but I like it,” Laraba said of the success Dillon and Farghaly had against East this season. “I think Ali, he is just a little magician with that ball. When he sees an opportunity to be able to do the things that he can do, I mean, he just goes right at it. It’s not just against East, it’s against everybody. He’s very, very hard to defend. I think Coby has just a little bit more of the I don’t want to say the other guys don’t have it, but, Coby has this rather drive where he wants, every time he wants to beat (East). So Coby’s got a knack for the goal. And I just think he enjoys big environments.”
Up next for Beckley is a matchup with the George Washington, the regional bogeyman. The Patriots have long dominated the region with the only blip coming in 2022 when East knocked the Patriots off on its way to a state championship. The Flying Eagles bucked the Patriots earlier this season, winning 2-0 in Charleston.
Now the challenge is to replicate that success in a bigger spot.
“They believed that they could be a team of George Washington’s quality in the regular season coming into that game,” Laraba said. “Then having it happen, that belief just energizes you. These guys have a belief that they are a very good team, and they can go toe to toe with anybody in the state, even a great program like George Washington. So they know they have to work hard. They know that George Washington is not going to lay down for them and we’re going to have to come out and play like we did in the second half of this game.”
