It had already been a long afternoon of soccer.
A hot one as well, with summer-like temperatures in the 80s.

The Pine Bush girls’ soccer team was tied with the Newburgh Free Academy Goldbacks after the conclusion of the first overtime period, until senior Morgan Tubbs got ahold of the ball.

Tubbs took possession of the ball inside the 18-yard box in the 93rd minute, blasting it inside the right goalpost, giving the Bushmen a 3-2 win over the Goldbacks on October 3 at NFA North.

“That was just to finish and be done,” Tubbs said. “It’s a little overdue. We got it done. We’ll take the win, and we’ll learn from it, and move on.”

The Bushmen have done a good job moving on since September 22, when they suffered their first Orange County Interscholastic Athletic Association Division I loss to the Monroe-Woodbury Crusaders.

They rebounded with three straight wins, beating the Kingston Tigers four days later, following with a win over the Spackenkill Spartans on October 2. The game against Spackenkill started a stretch of four games in five days for the Bushmen, who also faced the Middletown Middies on Thursday and the Minisink Valley Warriors on Saturday.

“It’s been up and down,” Pine Bush coach Dan Conley said. “We’re getting opportunities since we saw Monroe on that big field we have now. This field is a smaller one so it’s a little different game, but we’re still learning. Some younger players are stepping up, so we’re going in the right direction.

One of the younger players stepping up was sophomore Kathryn Cragan, who scored two goals in regulation for the Bushmen.

She scored the Bushmen’s first goal of the game in the 15th minute to give the Bushmen a 1-0 lead, and she broke a 1-1 tie in the second half with her second goal of the game.

“She can run all day,” Conley said. “She’s sortof like what they have in Marina (Parodo). She’s the one that can hit the ball from a distance so you can’t leave her space. If you press up on her, she’s going to go by you and hit from 30 yards.”

Both times she scored, the Goldbacks answered quickly. Parodo provided the first answer, scoring a goal of her own from the left side from about 20 yards away into the far corner of the goal, over the head of Pine Bush goalkeeper Shea Toback.

Newburgh’s Julia Leonard tied the game at 2-2 in the 72nd minute, which sent the game into overtime.

“We were a little frustrated,” Tubbs said. “We just want to win. That’s the bottom line. We want to win, and we know we can so it’s a little frustrating, but we took care of business. At the end of the day, it’s a win.”

The Bushmen got two more wins to finish the week, routing the Middletown Middies, 9-0, on Thursday before finishing the week with a 3-2 win over the Minisink Valley Warriors on Friday.