Sean C. Morgan
Of The New Era
The Husky boys varsity soccer team had mixed success its opening week with a 6-1 loss to Molalla and a 2-1 win over East Linn Christian Academy.
The Huskies opened on the road against Molalla on Sept. 6.
“They were a very talented team,” Coach Karl Schmidtman said. The Huskies were down 2-0 when Ben Schmidt scored the Huskies only goal 16 minutes into the game.
Schmidt scored on a free kick after Molalla fouled the Huskies outside the box, Schmidtman said.
“It felt like things might change again in our favor,” Schmidtman said. “But theys cored again 10 minutes later”
Molalla outshot the Huskies 9-4 in the first half, and Molalla led 3-1 at halftime.
Molalla scored three more goals on the game and led 22-8 shots on goal by the end of the game. Half of Molalla’s goals were free or penalty kicks.
Husky goalie Brandon Smith stopped a penalty kick, Schmidtman said. “The odds are that he shouldn’t. Goalies don’t stop those very often.”
Smith had eight saves on the game.
East Linn outshot the Huskies 10-7 on the game, Schmidtman said. The first half, the Huskies outshot East Linn 5-4.
Schmidt scored a goal at 29 minutes, Schmidtman said. East Linn tried to clear a ball in the goal, kicking it high. The backspin sent it between the goalposts for a Husky goal with 10 minutes left in the half.
The Huskies led 2-0 at halftime.
“The second half, we looked a little bit tired,” Schmidtman said. Overall, the teams played “pretty even” on the last half. With about 15 minutes left, East Linn took control. East Linn scored a goal with 10 minutes left on the game.
“The last 10 minutes, they had a lot of pressure on us, but our defense did a good job of clearing out and holding on the last 10 minutes.?
“Travis Walker is playing really great defense for us right now, lots of energy, very aggressive.”
Smith had one save against East Linn.
The Huskies played in a Jamboree on Sept. 10 at Cascade.
They played well the first half of the day, Schmidtman said. They played Central pretty well in their first half game, but Central pressured in three goals to win 3-0.
The Huskies tied Yamhill-Carlton next, Schmidtman said, but the Huskies outplayed them and would have won a full-length game.
The Huskies didn’t play well against Stayton, falling behind 3-0 in the first 10 minutes, Schmidtman said. “We played at least even with them after the first 10 minutes and outshot them.”
Taft forfeited the final game of the day to return home because of the thunderstorm.
Overall, “we were a little rusty,” Schmidtman said. “At times during the Jamboree we looked pretty sharp.”
Both passing and confidence improved during ther Jamboree, Schmidtman said, and getting senior left defender Tom Helfrich back starting with East Linn has improved the Husky defense.
The junior varsity fielded eight players against Molalla and lost, Schmidtman said. Players were out because of incomplete paperwork.