Even though the scoring opportunities were fairly equal, there was a dramatic difference in the game score. Whenever Western Albemarle was given a chance, it made the most of it, jumping out to a big lead in the first half and hanging on defensively in the second to put up a 5-0 win over Charlottesville on the road Monday night.
“We were patient to start the game,” said Warriors coach Paul Rittenhouse. “At some point our midfield decided they wanted to take over and control the pace of the game and that created some opportunities for us and we finished a good percentage of them.”
For the first 16 minutes, its was an even contest with neither Western nor hosting Charlottesville able to get too far into enemy territory. But the Warriors would get three great looks at the net over the next 15 minutes, and on all three occasions they managed to score.
Austin Ballard broke the 0-0 tie with just under 24 minutes to play when he collected a rebound off of a shot from teammate Will Odom and tucked it into the back of the goal. Five minutes later, senior Aaron Myers gave Western a 2-0 lead when he roofed a free kick. Odom was then able to beat Charlottesville on a penalty kick to wrap up the first half scoring.
“We try and set the tone early in the game and we kind of got lucky with the way (the ball) bounced on the first goal,” Odom said. “It’s important to finish opportunities like that. That’s what wins games.”
Conversely, Charlottesville pressed into Western’s defensive zone, but struggled to get past Warriors defenders Tom Rogers and Patrick Wayland as the two pushed speedy Black Knights forwards like Abdi Mohamed to the edges and were able to recover and take away most centering passes.
“It stood out in the first half,” Rittenhouse said. “I thought Patrick Wayland had an outstanding game back there. He really got run up and down. Patrick did a nice job of attacking the ball when he needed to and just covering his space. He did a lot of blue collar work.”
The Western offense continued to pour it on in the second half with Alex Nolet cleaning up on a breakaway opportunity and Linge Sun netting the game’s last goal with 23 minutes to play.
From that point on, the Knights would apply steady pressure on the Warriors defense, but Western goalie Kai Shin could not be beat as he made the most of his size and took away Charlottesville’s attempts to score on both far sides of the goal and finished the game with 10 saves.
The Black Knights, last year’s Jefferson District runner up, went into spring break with a big win over last year’s JD champs, Orange County. But after Monday’s loss they’re looking to restore the kind of effort before they take the field again.
“We’ll learn from this and go on and comeback and see (Western) again,” said Charlottesville coach Stephen Cost. “If we’re going to play at this level we need to work harder and we didn’t play hard. We need to work harder in practice and work harder on the field. We need to commit to it.”
Western (3-0-2, 2-0-1) will play at home for the first time this year when its hosts Monticello on Thursday at 6:30 p.m.
Charlottesville (2-1, 2-1) will head to Louisa County also on Thursday at 6:30 p.m.
