Soccer

Dear Parents,

     Yesterday the Bishops traveled south to face Carlisle at the Smith River Sports Complex outside of Martinsville.  They have a couple of turf fields down there, and we were lucky enough to play on one of them!  With a smooth roll of the ball and no potholes in sight, our players were amped to get out there and go.

     Much to my surprise, we scored in the 3^rd minute off of a corner kick which was played beautifully into the box and tapped home by one of our captains, Nick Peycke.  Nick is in his second year with the JV team and deserved this goal as he’s been setting a great example for all of our younger players. 

     Before we knew it, we had scored again.  Only this time it was a freshmen, Logan Slominski, who netted the ball to put us in front 2-0.  A ball had been played in from the left side of the field when a defender missed the clearance and, in what seemed like an eternity, the ball hovered above the ground begging for someone to put a head on it.  Well, Logan decided he was going to go and take care of that; and, with a powerful header over their best defender to the corner netting Logan single-headedly had put us in the driving seat only 15 minutes into the game.

     Carlisle settled down for the last 15 minutes of the first half and started figuring out their possession game.  Our defenders and midfielders were tested the rest of the half with some dangerous through balls that were either frantically cleared by Drew, Tom, Jacob, Riley or Zeil or scooped into the kung-fu like arms of our net-minder, Tyler Percario. 

     We made some adjustments at halftime, most notably putting Peter Harrington in on defense to deal with their best threat to our goal, number 10, and moving Logan over to the left wing and having Graham Allen take the reins up top as our lone striker.  Graham matched up well with their biggest and best defender, and ended up securing the victory for us with a follow up shot 6 minutes before the final whistle.  Carlisle, much like the pelting rain drops that unleashed themselves upon us in the second half, pressed forward and shelled us with shots.  Our defenders stood strong, cleared the ball and gave us chances on the counter-attack.  Despite a wonder-strike from their center back, number 16, we were able to prevail 3-1, and ride home wet, cold, tested, but, ultimately, victorious.

     My favorite moment of the day was when the skies opened up, and the other team’s bench ran for cover.  I looked back and saw all of our players, drenched and cold, chanting “BISHOPS” together.  A complete team victory. 

Thanks to Amy for providing the drinks and oranges.  They were a much needed bright spot amidst the chaos of a typical late summer squall.

Go Bishops!

Coach Bonner