Barr-Reeve falls short at Dubois
Oct. 3—DUBOIS — The Barr-Vikings soccer team (10-5) proved to be a tough out at the Northeast Dubois Sectional on Tuesday, with a 2-0 loss to the highly-regarded NE Dubois Jeeps.
The Viking program, now only in its second varsity year, posted an outstanding regular season (10-4) and gave the Jeeps everything they could handle for 80 minutes in the warmer than normal conditions Tuesday afternoon.
The Viking said goodbye to very strong senior class that helped build the program and are setting up a bright future for the perennially successful Class A school from Montgomery.
"I thought we played hard. Our two styles of play didn't mesh. We're more of a possession team and it was hard to get in our groove. When we are playing a team with a completely different style. You could see that they were more of a straightforward style, moving the ball from their backs, all the way up front and shooting from anywhere. We had a hard time getting getting the ball under control and in possessing it to get into the groove you needed to," said B-R coach Justin Wilson.
Northeast Dubois came out aggressive in the first three minutes of the game testing Bryce Cornelius, including a shot that went just off the top crossbar, however, Barr-Reeve became more aggressive, and for the first 10 minutes, the game was basically played on both sides of the field.
Dubois had an opportunity with a free kick deep in the Viking end however, it was quickly followed up with a scoring chance from Viking Nolan McCain, but neither shot was able to dent the back of the net.
The Jeeps continued to keep Cornelius busy including great save at 21:45 from the Barr-Reeve senior keeper to keep it scoreless.
The Vikings continue to have chances through the middle of the field but the Jeep backline kept many balls from getting to keeper Tanner Blackgrove.
The Vikings helped keep the Jeeps off the scoreboard for most of the first half, not only with Cornelius in play, but also the defensive effort from Dominic Wilson and Yadier Victoriano. However, with 1:32 left in the half, the Jeeps finally were able to get on the board as Landon Rueber was able to score to make it 1-0 and send Dubois into the half with a little momentum.
Blackgrove was forced to come up with a big save in the first minute of the second half, however, just two minutes later, Dubois would get its second goal, as NED's Adrian Keller made it 2-0.
Viking Logan Gallagher put a shot on goal seven minutes into the second half from about 40 yards out that forced Blackgrove to make a big save. Wilson moved up into the middle for B-R to help initiate a little more offense as the Vikes had more of an offensive surge in the middle of the second half. The Vikings kicked up the offensive pressure, however every attack seem to be countered by the Jeeps, as they finished off the half with the 2-0 win.
"You know, we were hoping that we could keep them scoreless and go from there. We knew that they were the favored and expected to win, but the longer we can keep it scoreless or tie the game, the pressure would mount and we hoped that pressure might force them to panic a little bit. Unfortunately, that goal right before halftime really took the wind out of our sails a little bit, but you know, I thought we played hard until the very last second of the game.
"We've got a lot of young kids and we were building a program, so we hope to be in contention for the sectional title every year going forward," added Wilson.
