TRENTON -- Eight straight years Skyline High School girls soccer coach Chris Morgan coached in regional games. As the head coach at cross-town Pioneer, teams under Morgan's tutelage won districts, and sometimes more, from 1998 through 2005.

After Skyline defeated Berkley 1-0 in its MHSAA Division 2 regional semifinal at Trenton High School on Tuesday, Morgan said the feeling was incomparable.

"This surpasses any win I had at Pioneer. ... Those girls, we were supposed to win. We had studs, seniors that were going on to be Division I college players," Morgan said of his days at Pioneer. "I have freshman and sophomores. It's amazing, absolutely amazing. Some are just 14 years old, going up against 18-year-olds. It's incredible."

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Berkley had all the scoring opportunities in the first half, outshoot Skyline (9-2-2) four to one, though only one shot was on goal, which Victoria Norris easily saved.

The Bears' best opportunity came off of a free kick, when Lindsey Lubanski sent a chip to Natalie Zimmerman who beat her two defenders after cleanly receiving the ball, but sailed her shot well high.

It was a rare breakdown in the Skyline backline of Justine Jahnke, Emily Anderson and Lauren Halpern, which kept Zimmerman and company in check all night.

"We knew they had a frontrunner up top that was dangerous, Zimmerman, we were well aware of her so we wanted to make sure we had two defenders on her, she still got her opportunities, but we did a good job of limiting that," Morgan said. "As a whole, our defense, we've lived on them."

In the 50th minute, Carmen Flesher broke the scoreless tie. Flesher received the ball near half on the left side, beat her defender on the outside, cut to the middle near the penalty box and curved a right footed shot to the right side-netting as two defenders crashed on her from both sides.

"It happened so fast, you just don't even think about it, it's just instinct. You keep going

to the goal," Flesher said. "It's the one thing you're going for and you don't stop ‘til you get there."

Norris had six saves in the second half, but it was Jahnke who had the save of the night.

After stopping an initial shot on a one-on-one, Norris collided with Berkley's Katie Murphy going for the rebound. Murphy put the ball on net, but Jahnke tracked back and cleared the ball from the mouth of the goal just as it was about to cross the end line.

Zimmerman had one last shot from just inside the penalty area with under a minute to play, but Norris didn't surrender a rebound this time around.

"We couldn't finish, had a couple of really good chances that we couldn't put it in the back of the net, and we just couldn't finish," said Berkley coach Cliff Brandmier. "Been kind of an Achilles heel for us all year."

Morgan thought his girls looked scared in the first half, but it was clear that wasn't the case in the second. As Livonia Ladywood and Riverview warmed up to play in the second semifinal of the night, Norris didn't much care who the Eagles' opponent for the finals would be (Ladywood won, 4-1, setting up Saturday's 7 p.m. championship game).

"I don't even know who's playing," Norris said, glancing over her shoulder, then looking back with a smile. "Next team is next victim."

Pete Cunningham covers sports for AnnArbor.com. He can be reached at petercunningham@annarbor.com or by phone at 734-623-2565. Follow him on Twitter @petcunningham