Boys soccer defeats Topeka Seamen in first game of week
Substitute players get time to shine as Jags win 6-2
October 5, 2017
Boys soccer came out on top at home Monday, Oct. 2 against Topeka Seamen with a final score of 6-2.
The game started of strong, with the Jags controlling the ball in the offensive half of the field. Sophomore Ian Carroll scored the first goal 12 minutes into the game.
For head coach Arlan Vomhof, playing Topeka Seamen is always personal since his first coaching position was at that school.
“It’s always nice to beat [Topeka Seamen],” Vomhof said. “Since starting that program back in 1992, it’s always nice to beat the old school.”
Twenty minutes into the first half junior Jake Ashford scored the Jag’s second goal off a corner kick.
Ashford felt confident in his teammate going into the game.
“I was pretty confident,” Ashford said. “We have a very good team, [and] I had a feeling we were going to come out and beat them.”
Junior Eric Melendez helped the team finish the second half strong with his second varsity goal.
According to junior Brock Denney, the team felt confident in the score at the end of the first half, but also felt there were things they could have capitalized on but did not.
“3-0 is always a good score going into the [second] half, but there were a lot of chances that we could have finished better,” Denney said. “You’re not always going to finish them all.”
The second half opened with Topeka Seamen scoring in the first six minutes. They then scored again 13 minutes into the half, but not before Ashford had his second goal of the game in the form of a header.
According to Ashford the speed of play started out slow in the beginning, but the Jags picked it up once Topeka began to increase their offense.
“We realized they were kind of coming back on us, so we started playing like we can,” Ashford said. “We came out slow at the start of the second half, so we just picked it up and started going faster.”
Topeka Seamen failed to score again the rest of the game, but the Jags picked up two more goals. One by junior Ricardo Araujo and Ashford completed a hat trick with his third goal six minutes before the end of the game.
Denney believes the team needed to increase their effort in the second half to ensure they would win the game.
“We want to make sure we step it up, do our part and make sure we work,” Denney said. “Since we had some people coming off and some [substitute players] coming in, we want to make sure everyone on the field can do their best to finish the job.”
The Jags play their next game at Blue Valley Southwest at 6:30 p.m. on Thursday, Oct. 4.
