Cultivating Christian Minds and Character
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Winter 2008 Season
Cats overwhelm Lions in first district match
On a balmy Saturday afternoon, the third seed Wildcats faced the sixth seed University Lions for the first match of the 2008 District tournament. The match was settled after 32 seconds when Tim Miller blasted a shot in the goal after receiving a nifty cross pass from Jake Appelbaum from the left corner. The Cats went on to score nine more goals while holding the overwhelmed Lions scoreless. It was a total team effort as everyone on the roster played for half of the time and nine different players had a goal and/or an assist. Final score was 10-0 when the match was stopped after 65 minutes.
The starting squad consisted of Goal Keeper: Tim Reed; Defenders: Jake Grimes, Caleb Olson, Michael Evetts and Matt Schwartz; Midfielders: Matt Hudnut, Tim Miller, Jake Appelbaum, and Seth Lillenberg; and Forwards: Connor Hunsicker and Anthony Pritchett. These guys played for 30 minutes and scored nine goals including a “hat-trick” by Connor Hunsicker and two goals by Tim Miller and Anthony Pritchett. Connor Hunsicker and Jake Appelbaum each contributed three assists and Caleb Olson had two.
But the real story of this match was the way the rest of the Wildcats played. Defenders: Matt Reilly, Austin Gantner, Forrest Hughes and Ethan Cobbel; Midfielders: Jack Ross, John Hunsicker, Matt Baldwin, Nick Arnold and John Caldwell; and Forwards: Curtis Stump, Caleb Unser and Teddy Sutcliffe. These Cats played the majority of the match, held the Lions scoreless and Nick Arnold scored the prettiest goal in the 65th minute after a very skillful cross pass from Jack Ross.
Matt Reilly, playing on a sore ankle, anchored the defense and served as the on the field leader. Assisting him on the back line, Austin Gantner, Forrest Hughes and Ethan Cobbel shut down every scoring threat the Lions could must and also calmly knocked the ball around the back field and passed up to the midfielders.
Matt Baldwin and John Hunsicker led the midfielders with some tremendous give and go passes along with strong efforts from Jack Ross, Nick Arnold and John Caldwell who also strung together some great passes and won 50/50 balls from the Lions.
In the forward position, Caleb Unser played full throttle, for example in the 38th minute when he won the ball near the Lions goal and nearly scored, along with great efforts from Curtis Stump and Teddy Sutcliffe.
In the 55th minute, Jack Ross, Curtis Stump and Nick Arnold strung together some beautiful passes setting up a shot which Nick blasted just wide of the Lion’s goal. In the 56th minute, Tim Reed made the save of the match on a U City shot from point blank range to earn his 6th solo shut-out. A couple minutes later, Caleb Unser sent a beautiful cross pass to Forrest Hughes who headed the ball just wide of the goal. In the 60th minute, Matt Baldwin showed his grit and skill by making several strong runs with the ball and launching a shot just wide. In the 61st minute, Ethan Cobbel showed outstanding hustle as he won the ball from the attacking Lion player. In the 62nd minute, Forrest Hughes sent a skillfully played pass to Matt Baldwin’s feet and he one touched a shot just wide. There were many other examples of great team play by all the players, but this writer simply couldn’t scribble down notes fast enough to record them all. The bottom line is that everyone on the roster made a large contribution to today’s win.
The next district match-up pits the MICDS Rams against the Cats on Monday at 4:00PM at Clayton High School. Get ready for a thriller as these two teams battle it out in the rubber match after each has beat the other once in the regular season with a combined score of 4-4.
Scoring summary: Time Goal Assist 0:32 Tim Miller Jake Appelbaum 10:48 Connor Hunsicker Caleb Olson 14:06 Matt Hudnut Connor Hunsicker 15:34 Anthony Pritchett Connor Hunsicker 42:11 Tim Miller Connor Hunsicker 43:03 Connor Hunsicker Jake Grimes 47:20 Connor Hunsicker Jake Appelbaum 49:25 Jake Grimes Caleb Olson 52:30 Anthony Pritchett Jake Appelbaum 65:00 Nick Arnold Jack Ross