BEDFORD, N.H. — The Stevens High girls soccer team had not conceded a goal since Oct. 1 entering the NHIAA Division III state championship on Saturday.

The fifth-seeded Cardinals’ stout back line, one that had engineered a nine-match shutout streak and recorded 14 clean sheets in total this season, had held third-seeded St. Thomas without a goal through 70 minutes of play.

But against the run of play in the 71st minute, the Saints’ Mallory Baker found the breakthrough goal off a free kick. Her looping 35-yard boot sailed over Stevens goalkeeper Audrina Pelton and nestled into the side netting, securing a 1-0 championship win.

“It just didn’t fall our way this game,” Stevens senior center back Isabella Bovell said. “There’s nothing you can do about it. Sometimes you’re on, sometimes you’re not.”

Baker couldn’t believe she had scored — neither could the Cardinals. Stevens had largely dictated play at Bedford High, taking the Saints out of their typical style of play while controlling the game’s tempo and pace, Cardinals coach Tim St. Pierre said.

The soccer gods can be a cruel bunch, though, and sometimes the game simply doesn’t break your way, even in spite of your best efforts, he said.

“That’s the sport we choose to participate in,” St. Pierre said. “The team that dictates tempo and pace doesn’t always win. We’ve been on the other side of it, too. (But) we feel good about our performance.”

Stevens’ first attacking opportunity came in the 10th minute. It would be denied by the woodwork not once, but twice.

Sophomore Faith Norton saw her ball tipped up by St. Thomas keeper Gennevieve Bolduc and off the crossbar. The ball fell to the feet of another Cardinals attacker, whose subsequent rebound shot hit off the side post before being cleared away after a scramble in the box.

Stevens continued to knock on the door throughout the first half. Bailey Leavitt was unable to bag an opening tally for the Cardinals despite a couple of chances in front of the net in the 21st minute. Peyton Ferland, whose two goals on Monday lifted Stevens to a semifinals win, saw her shots saved or blocked time and time again.

Entering the intermission, St. Pierre said he called his squad’s first-half performance “great.” He wanted to see the Cardinals build on the confidence created from the opening 40 minutes of play. They did and “generated plenty of opportunities” in the second half, St. Pierre said.

But no opportunity was better than when freshman Zoey Friesen stepped to the spot for a penalty in the 64th minute.

Ferland, the team’s normal penalty taker, was on the bench. Her on-field absence meant St. Pierre had to tab someone else for this all-important penalty. He opted to call on Friesen, who he labeled as “our purest goal scorer in the moment.”

In arguably the loneliest moment in soccer, an individual battle separated by 12 yards and one kick of the ball, Friesen saw her shot initially saved. But the Saints’ Bolduc had parried the ball right back into Friesen’s path. She had another chance. The ensuing rebound effort off of Friesen’s right boot sailed over the crossbar.

As a host of St. Thomas players celebrated Bolduc, a trio of Cardinals were quick to console Friesen. After all, there were still 16 minutes on the clock — plenty of time to score the game’s opening goal.

The Saints were the one galvanized by the moment, though, with several players encouraging their team to seize the momentum. They did. Just seven minutes later, Baker’s 35-yard free kick goal saw St. Thomas claim a one-goal advantage it would never relinquish.

“I’m just so proud of our performance,” St. Pierre said. “I can’t get over that part. But, I mean, you play in a final, you’re lucky to get one or two great chances. We could have scored five goals today.”

Stevens graduates four seniors — Bovell, Nevaeh LeBlanc, Brianna Marsh and Rhea Quick — but will return the bulk of its roster from a team that closed the season winning 10 of its last 11 games and outscored opponents 84-8 in 20 games.

The Cardinals will begin to prepare for the 2025 season in the winter, St. Pierre said, in hopes of making another deep postseason run and potentially capturing the program’s first state championship since 1988. Although Bovell played her final game for Stevens, she believes next season’s team is “going to go far.”

“It was a great way to finish out my years,” Bovell said. “This team, we played together. We really wanted this, even though we didn’t get it. You could just tell how connected we were and how we just played for each other.”

Alex Cervantes can be reached at acervantes@vnews.com or 603-727-7302.