Junction City beat a battered Sweet Home team 5-1 in girls soccer Thursday, Oct. 6.
It was the Huskies’ most lopsided loss this season.
Coach Ramiro Santana said he had eight injured as of Monday evening, although some of them are playing ball. The Huskies started the game down Kendyl Stutzman and Jessilynn Thomas, who will be out for the season.
“We had our main players, I didn’t play them because they were hurt,” Santana said. “That kind of hurt us. We did all right for the first 20 minutes.”
Junction City scored first in about 10 minutes, and the Huskies answered immediately, he said. The Huskies moved the ball to the outside of the goal area where Junction City knocked down Cora McKee. Hannah Jewett backed her up and scored the goal.
The Huskies stayed with Junction City for awhile, Santana said, but then Kenzi Adams and Ashley Farthing came off the midfield with injuries.
“That’s when things started to go crazy,” he said. Junction City pressured the Huskies and scored four more goals by halftime.
Milah Weld and McKee had both hurt their ankles by that point, Santana said, but he shifted the team around to bolster the midfield, dropping Weld to mid and moving up Sydney Mauer from defense.
Neither team scored again.
“We’re still here,” Santana said. “We still can go either way.”
That will depend a lot on how well the Huskies are feeling though, he said.
The Huskies were scheduled to play Sisters Tuesday and will play Sutherlin in their final home appearance at 7 p.m. on Thursday.
As of Monday, they were 3-3 in league and in fourth place behind Sutherlin, 3-2-1; Elmira, 4-2; and Junction City, 5-1.They travel to Cottage Grove on Oct. 18 and Elmira on Oct. 20.
“We need to be smart,” Santana said. “We need to get our game back up and start playing. We need to pick up again, the way we started.”