Fabulous First
KARNS CITY — The last thing on Zach Caldwell's mind Monday night was scoring a goal.
The Slippery Rock senior defender wound up doing one better — netting the game-winner as the Rockets defeated previously unbeaten Karns City, 2-0, in a non-region boys soccer game at Diehl Stadium.
Caldwell broke a scoreless tie with 22 minutes to play, heading in a corner kick by Riley Lewis.
“That was the first goal I've ever scored in varsity soccer,” said Caldwell, a three-year starter for the Rockets. “I'm pretty tall and I saw Riley's kick was coming in high.
“I figured I could jump up there and be the first one to get to the ball.”
Caldwell leaped into a crowd of players and did exactly that.
“One of those things,” Karns City coach Jim Grenninger said. “Their kid headed the ball, then it bounced off one of our guys and into the net.”
The Rockets, undefeated in District 10 region play, improved to 11-3 overall. Their second goal came 51 seconds after the first. Nathaniel Willison's free kick from 40 yards was stopped by KC goalkeeper Nate Boynden, but the ball deflected off his fingers, toward the field of play.
Before Boynden could retrieve the ball, Slippery Rock's Liam Gallagher beat him to it and drilled the ball into the net.
After the teams played a fairly even first half to a 0-0 tie, Slippery Rock controlled play in the second half offensively.
“Their defense was playing pretty far back, so we decided to try to spread the field more and it worked for us,” Slippery Rock coach Kyle Hopkins said.
Ten of the Rockets' 11 shots on net and four of their six corner kicks occurred in the second 40 minutes. Karns City (13-1) managed only one shot on goal in the second half.
With 17:20 remaining, Nate Rondinelli was alone in the box with the ball, only to have Slippery Rock goalkeeper Duncan MCoy rob him with a foot save.“We were looking for a competitive game close to home and playing (Karns City) made sense,” Hopkins said. “We've had four-hour round-trip bus trips to Warren, five hours to Bradford ... It felt good to come down here and play.“I'm sure this game benefitted both teams.”Grenninger agreed.“We don't have too many competitive teams in District 9,” the Gremlins coach admitted. “This was the best team we've faced. Punxsutawney came in here and was probably the closest team in quality to Slippery Rick that we've played.“We looked a little ragged tonight. We're in the midst of playing seven games in 11 days. We have three or four guys who played tonight after football practice. They (Slippery Rock) have more depth than us and it showed.”The Gremlins had their chances in the first half. Dakota King slammed a shot off the right post midway through the period. Owen Collwell was denied by a lunging McCoy save in the final two minutes of the half.Slippery Rock's Ryan Davey fed Colton Callen in the box with 24 minutes left in the first half, but goalkeeper Malik Metcalfe broke up the play. Davey nearly gave the Rockets a 3-0 lead late, but his shot hit the crossbar with 2:10 remaining.“Maybe this game didn't mean anything (in the region),” but good competition never hurt anybody,” Caldwell said.McCoy had five saves to get the shutout for Slippery Rock.The Rockets host Franklin Tuesday while Kane visits Karns City.
