Faith Christian takes down two-time defending state champ in District 1 final

After three straight years as runners up, Faith Christian Academy celebrated their first district championship since 2021 with a 1-0 win over Dock Mennonite on Tuesday night at Norristown Area High School.

With the game scoreless, Lily Klock – who was instrumental in limiting prolific goal-scorer Ashley Brown all night – pushed forward into the Dock midfield and delivered a perfectly weighted ball through the back line to Paula Marti-Font, who calmly finished the lone goal of the night.

“I wasn’t thinking about anything, just striking the ball into the net,” said Marti-Font, who as a first-year player from Spain had only heard stories of the previous seasons’ heartbreaking ends. “I’m happy because it’s my first year with the team and my first year here.”

Faith Christian coach Ben Sauers said Marti-Font’s addition – along with two other international students from Spain – has given the team a different look in their pursuit of a state championship, which they’ll get a chance to continue after earning the lone state tournament berth out of District 1 in Class A.

“Paula has been phenomenal in our center mid,” Sauers said. “She’s very good with the ball.”

Klock, an East Stroudsburg commit, had been picking her spots to push into the Dock end with the ball and after a few promising runs found the right combination in the 56th minute to set Marti-Font up.

“I’ve always been comfortable getting forward because I know I can recover back,” Klock said. “And Paula, she’s so composed on the ball and her play is very different from ours coming in here but I think it meshes really well, because when you find her, especially in front of goal, she can stay calm and put it in. As soon as I hit her, I knew that we would be good.”

Faith Christian’s win follows a 1-1 draw with Dock earlier this month in regular season play and extended their unbeaten streak to 10 games. It also puts the program on a stage more familiar in recent years to the school’s boys team, which has won a district title five straight seasons.

“They’ve been waiting for this for a long time,” Sauers said. “The seniors have been waiting for this since they were in middle school so it’s something that they’ve earned. I think they looked forward to this night, and they came out with the confidence they needed to win.”

Dock Mennonite’s season ends without a chance to defend their back-to-back Class A state titles but the Pioneers will have star forward Ashley Brown – who reached the century mark in career goals earlier this year – back for one more season.