"Winning the cup was our first time, and it was a great feeling," the U17 player said. "That's what we were working on all year. Last year, we played against a lot of good competition. This year we did, too, but we just played our way through it."
Moore, who plays high school soccer in Bartow County for the Woodland Lady Wildcats, said her club team, Southern Soccer Academy's 95 Elite Team, began giving its all in the fall and that commitment continued in the spring when soccer players represented their schools. She said when that season finished up, the players returned to their clubs and practiced Sundays, then began training about a month ago to play for the state championship.
Still, winning the state championship Sunday was not easy because it featured two defensive-minded teams who were unable to separate themselves on the scoreboard during 90 minutes of regulation play or the two 10-minute overtimes that followed, a total of 110 minutes. In fact, Southern did not earn its victory until the penalty shootout.
Moore, who played center back the entire game, said that's when the play of Erica Laurens, a Cobb County teammate, proved the difference between Southern and NASA 13 Elite II, who play in the U-17 Athena division.
"Our goalie stopped all three of their shots and we scored our three PKs," she said.
The performance gave Southern a 2-1 victory.
Woodland coach Kyle Morgan said Moore is the first Lady Wildcat player on a team that won a state championship.
Moore said her Woodland teammates have reacted warmly to the accomplishment.
"I felt proud we won," she added.
Moore started playing her game at The Trinity School of Cartersville and later played for the Cartersville Clash.
She was recruited while at the Clash to play at Southern four years ago.
Moore's team is not through with the tournament, however.
Southern will now represent Georgia in the regionals with hopes of advancing from there to the nationals.
Moore, who is in her fourth year with the club, all as a starter, said the regional competition should be very tough, too.
The regionals will begin Thursday in Greenville, S.C., and will feature about 3,000 players from U-13 to U-18 drawn from such southern states as North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Florida, Alabama, Georgia and Texas.
They will face other state winners and teams that finished first or second in the regionals held at the states.
Moore isn't the only Bartow County participant in the regionals.
Sydney James, goalie for the Cartersville Lady Purple Hurricanes, is a member of the NASA 14 Elite, which finished as the runner-up to Tophat 14 Gold, state champions in the U16 girls division.
NASA 14 Elite lost 1-0 to Tophat on Sunday.