Boys lose to ‘Dogs, whack Blue Devils, T-Falls
Nancy Underdahl | Hungry Horse News | UPDATED 11 months, 1 week AGO
Neehl Adams makes a move on his defender, closing in on the Whitefish goal. Seth Anderson Photo.
The Columbia Falls boys soccer team split the week with a physical 2-0 loss against their crosstown rivals Whitefish Bulldogs on Sept. 4 in Columbia Falls and a 11-1 win Sept. 6 in Corvallis, against the Blue Devils.
In the conference matchup against the Bulldogs, it was neck-and -neck until the 32-minute mark when Whitefish scored with a goal by Graysen Rembaugh (Kyler Jonson assist). Whitefish would come out in the second half and seal the deal for the Dogs at the 42nd minute mark. The Cats allowed 13 shots on the goal and had eight of their own. Keeper Brady Heitz had nine saves. Cats had six fouls and five yellow cards on the night while the Dogs would have 15 fouls and four yellow cards.
“The Whitefish game was a tough lesson for the boys to learn and only the second game of the regular season. But it really helped to identify areas of our game to improve. You have to look for the positives after a game like that,” said coach O’Brien Byrd said.
After their tough loss to the Dogs, the Cats headed to Corvallis on Saturday for a non-conference game with the Blue Devils. Jack Harris had a hat trick on the afternoon. Adding to the scoring were Ramsey Cuffe with two, Brady Bell, Jackson Scholz, Neehl Adams, and Will Albrecht each with one.
The Wildcats controlled from the start when Bell scored at the 4 minute mark and didn’t look back from there. The Blue Devils would score a lone goal in the second half. The Cats had 19 shots while Corvallis had 2. Corvallis drew 5 fouls and the Cats had two.
The Cats made some adjustments in their game against the Blue Devils.
“We changed our system of play to address some positions that we couldn’t fill. Remember, this is a completely different team from the last couple years,” Byrd said.
The Cats will have two games this upcoming week. They’ll face Thompson Falls/Plains in a home game on Tuesday after presstime and will face off against Bigfork in an away game on Saturday.
“We will continue to embrace this new system and work on the fine details to get us ready for Tuesday match versus Thompson Falls and Saturday’s match versus Bigfork,” Byrd said.
On Tuesday the Wildcats thumped Class B Thompson Falls/Plains, 8-0. Brady Bell led the Cats with a hat trick.