MONMOUTH — Jillian Holden’s goal in the 98th minute Wednesday lifted second-seeded Madison to a 2-1 double-overtime victory against top-ranked Monmouth Academy, putting the Bulldogs into the Class C girls’ soccer state final.

Madison (16-1) will play Houlton (16-1) at 12:30 p.m. Saturday at Deering High in Portland.

Holden’s day, which also included a goal in the first minute, bookended a 14-save effort from Lauren Hay.

“We wanted to get that win,” said Hay, whose only loss came to the Mustangs (15-2). “I wanted to make it to states.”

An errant touch by a Monmouth midfielder sent Holden running down the right side, where she beat two defenders and cut a path toward the net. Goalkeeper Destiny Clough got a piece of the shot but not enough to keep it from skipping into the back of the net less than three minutes into the second 15-minute second overtime.

“I went through and my shot was just hard enough to get right through her legs,” Holden said. “I was looking to just get it in there. Anything works. A goal is a goal.”

The game featured numerous shifts in momentum.

Madison started quickly with Holden’s goal on a sloppy field only seconds after the kickoff. For nearly 10 minutes, the Bulldogs were on the offensive until the counter-attack for Monmouth started gaining traction and produced Alicen Burnham’s strike in the ninth minute.

The final 20 minutes of the half belonged to Monmouth, which boasted 14 shots, including 10 on target, by halftime.

Audrey Fletcher nearly took advantage of chaos in the Madison back line in the 20th minute, but her bid from 12 yards sailed over the crossbar. At 33 minutes, Tia Day took a shot that Hay saved at the near post, and three minutes later Hay made consecutive stops to thwart a building Mustang opportunity.

“When you get opportunities and you don’t finish them off, you always think it’s going to haunt you,” Monmouth Coach Gary Trafton said. “We didn’t have as many in the second half as we did in the first, and you had that (play) where (we) tried to heel it in and the goalie was right there. What are you going to do?”

“What we asked them to do was to play good defense the whole game,” Madison co-coach Mike Walsh said. “They did. We asked them to push forward where they could and try to work the wings. If we put it down the middle (Monmouth sweeper Abbey Allen) hammered it back. … We were trying to do that the whole game but we just did it better at the end.”

The first overtime was all Madison, statistically and territorially, and it stayed that way until Holden scored the goal that won it.

“These girls have worked so hard all year, and they wanted this so badly, they just pulled it from … well, I don’t know where they get it,” Walsh said. “They didn’t run out of energy. They just kept it going.”

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