By Luke Nadkarni / Scrimmageplaycva.com contributor
Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: Jefferson District rivals Western Albemarle and Charlottesville required extra time to decide their matchup.
That was where the similarities to the teams’ first matchup ended, however. No winner emerged from 100 minutes of scoreless soccer Wednesday night in Crozet.
The Warriors ended up with more offensive chances, outshooting the Black Knights 9-5, but neither team was able to find the back of the net due to some brilliant play from goalkeepers Carter Kitchin of CHS and Al Luna of Western.
Western’s best chance of the first half came on a flurry beginning in the 27th minute when Will Thomas uncorked a free kick from the left side about 25 yards out. The ball cleared the outstretched hands of Kitchin, but hit the crossbar and bounced away. Four minutes later, Daniel Forsman threaded a perfect pass to a wide-open Jake Paulson, but Paulson’s shot flew wide of the net.
A couple of minutes after that, Colin Moore had an opportunity right in front of the net, but his shot was deflected away by the Charlottesville defense.
Charlottesville nearly struck six minutes into the second half when Theo Heard worked his way down toward the left side of the net, but Western keeper Al Luna, playing on his senior night, was there for the save. Luna recorded five saves on the night.
On the other end four minutes later, Kitchin showed some flash of his own when he stopped a point-blank shot from Aidan Sinclair, who had taken a through-ball from Thomas and outrun the defender. Kitchin made another brilliant save in the 63rd minute, this time on a 10-yard shot from Paulson.
“Our goalkeeper is a freshman and he is doing a great job,” Charlottesville head coach Stephan Cost said. “He’s just stepped in and he’s working hard. He made some impressive saves tonight, diving saves, looking good.
The Black Knights nearly scored directly after that, first on an individual effort from Musa Mohamed, who managed to keep control of the ball while being harassed by two Warrior defenders. But his shot was pushed just wide by Luna, and on the ensuing corner kick, Jake O’Connor put a shot barely wide right of the net.
“[Mohammed] is a great leader and we play much better with him on the field,” Cost said. “The way he controls the ball on the sideline, keeping it in bounds, and he’s fully upright when he’s doing it.”
In the extra session, the Warriors’ Wilson Brown nearly put Western ahead but his header off a corner kick floated wide left. Less than a minute later, Paulson had a golden opportunity from five yards away but Kitchin made a spectacular save.
“Both teams had chances. I think we generated a lot of good chances, and we would have liked to capitalize on one of those,” Western Albemarle coach Paul Rittenhouse said. “To our credit, we’ve been bleeding goals in a lot of games, and our defense really held strong tonight.”
