Jacob Estep Sets Wheeling Central Soccer Scoring Mark
Records are nice, but senior is about the team
Trending
WHEELING -- Wheeling Central soccer standout Jacob Estep doesn't care for the spotlight.
Whenever he steps on the soccer field, all he wants to do is have fun with his teammates, and most importantly, win.
Wheeling Central has done a lot of winning since he stepped on the soccer field. Estep also likes to score goals. And he does that. A lot.
Recently, the senior etched his name into school history, becoming the leading goal scorer, male or female.
"It is exciting," Estep said following a sectional semifinal victory against Oak Glen last week. "When I came out, I was injured and we won five games. Then we won the sectionals last year. Just as a team we have grown so much."
Estep's goal total stands at 118 following a hat trick against Trinity on Saturday that gave the Maroon Knights a second straight sectional championship.
He passed the boys' mark previously held by Chris Carroll from 1993-96 and surpassed the school mark former girls' all-stater Kenadee Wayt set last year.
"None of this wouldn't happen if it wasn't for my teammates around me," Estep said. "I have Austin Nestor in the middle, he plays me the ball. Tom (Minor) is a huge part of our success. Everybody else steps up.
"It is just not me, it is the team around me that really sets me up for the goals."
It was a career that got off to a rocky start.
Estep hadn't even played a varsity game when he was injured at the Brooke Soccer-Rama before his freshman campaign, losing that season with a tibia/fibula fracture and a dislocated ankle.
So Estep has set this record in three years of play, an average of more than 39 goals a year.
"I knew Chris Carroll and he was a phenomenal player, very quick, very fast, very similar to Jacob," Wheeling Central coach Brian Komoroski said. "Jake's injury his freshman year could have ended his career and for most people it would have. He put in a lot of work.
"He is a very humble kid. He doesn't want the headlines, doesn't want the press, doesn't do the flamboyant celebrations. He is a good, good kid and I would take a thousand of him, even if he wasn't scoring goals."
Estep has been first team all-state and first team All-Valley two straight seasons. Last year, he became the first Wheeling Central player to captain the All-Valley squad.
"You have to be smart," Estep said. "In the past few years, I could dribble more. Now teams are double-teaming me more. Passing to the other guys.
"(Being unselfish) helps the team. That is the goal. It is not for me to break a record. It is to get the team to a sectional title and more."
Despite playing soccer since he was 3 years old, Estep is taking in these few weeks. He doesn't plan on playing in college and just focusing on his studies. So when the Maroon Knights' season comes to an end, so will his soccer career.
The Maroon Knights travel to Oak Glen on Tuesday to face East Fairmont in the Class AA/A Region One championship. No Wheeling Central team has reached the state tournament.
"I have to take in the soccer while I have it," Estep said. "Getting to the state tournament would be exciting. It has never been done before. Last year we had our first sectional and hopefully we can complete this journey and take it all the way down state."