5/26/09 - Substate-Des Moines East -

Regardless of the outcome of the game tonight this will be one of the hardest set of comments that I will have to write in a long long time.  We welcome to town tonight Des Moines East for the first round of the Sub state.  Because of the way the brackets are set we happen to be Visitors on our own field but hey that is ok, we didn't have to travel.  We start the game in a light drizzle and wind out of the north.  We win the coin toss and choose to take the wind the second half.  The first half is a solid defensive battle for 40 minutes.  We asked our senior leaders to step up tonight and looked for someone to be the one that would make a difference.  This will be the last game the seniors will play on their home turf and you want it to be a good one.   East likes to play a through ball or long ball style of game.  We had a solid defensive stand tonight by Ryan Cook, Colin Duffy, Jordan Higgins, and Chris Wenck as they managed to shut down every attack they threw at us.  We did not let up and fought very hard.  With time running out Troy Mahood is able to get behind the defense and touches the ball on goal.  It rolls into the net but they wave it off saying that the ball did not cross the line before the end of the half.  That was a heart break at that point and would be more so later in the game.  We felt very good about being able to survive the first half and the wind.  We asked them to stay marked up, take advantage of the wind, take control, communicate, keep the ball on the ground, and take the shot on goal, you will win this game.  Just over a minute into the second half Kyle Larkin sends the ball forward to Nate Dreager and he is able to turn and hit from over 20 yards out on goal.  The shot beats the keeper and we go up 1-0.   Minutes later we are called for a foul on their half, they set up a direct kick from about 25 yards out.  They hit the ball, it bounces about 4 yards out, catches Mark Richwine off guard and sneaks into the goal.  We are tied up at 1.  Minutes later they knock in their second goal off a hard hit from about 20 yards out and go up now 2-1.  We change up our attack with 20 minutes left in the game to try to force the ball up front and get some shots on goal.  We certainly have our chances, but we are just wide or high.  We did have our chances again tonight but it just was not to be.  I felt we played hard, we gave what we had to give, it just turned out to not be enough.  A very good game was played tonight by Nate Dreager, Kyle Larkin, Nate Jones, and Tyler Butler.  It will be a game they all will look back on years from now and be able to say they gave what they could at the time. 

We will have our end of the year banquet to say good bye to everyone one more time and hand out the end of the season awards including MVP.  Thank you again to our seniors who provided outstanding leadership and direction for the team.  It is always very hard to say good bye so I won't say it just yet.  Check back in a few days and I will post the banquet date and we will also being call each player to let you know when it is.   At that time you will be asked to bring your uniforms and ball if you had a school ball signed out to you. 

Thank you all for your support and your visits to our page. Keep checking back I will post different things off and on.  Interested in how the boys did and what they look like, then check out the 2009 Varsity Squad & Stats and 2009 Junior Varsity Squad & Stats pages to see our running season stats. Check back again for more comments.