Garden City ? Freshman Brittany Hoffman scored the golden goal off a through ball from fellow freshman Julia Larkin to lift Free State High to a 1-0, double-overtime Class 6A soccer regional victory over Garden City on Tuesday.

“The girls deserve this one,” FSHS coach Kelly Barah said. “It’s been awhile since we had a playoff win, so it was kind of good.”

The Firebirds (6-8-3) were seeded 11th in the Central/South Central’s third region, while Garden City (9-6-1) was the sixth seed.

FSHS left for the match at 6 a.m. Tuesday.

“We were actually excited about that,” Barah said of the road trip out West. “We’ve never had a trip like this in this program, so taking them out here on a chartered bus … they were excited.”

Free State will face No. 3 seed Manhattan (13-4-0) at 6 p.m. Thursday at Manhattan in the regional championship. MHS advanced with an 11-0 rout of No. 14 seed Wichita Southeast on Monday.