Bowling Green’s Hayden Fox changes direction with the ball against Napoleon on Saturday. (Nicholas Huenefeld | Sentinel-Tribune)
By Nicholas Huenefeld
Special to the Sentinel-Tribune
The Bowling Green boys soccer team suffered a heartbreaking 1-0 loss to Napoleon inside Bobcat Stadium on Saturday, making the team’s path to an NLL Cardinal Division title a bit tougher.
“I expected a close, physical game,” BG head coach Josh Fox said. “We know each other so well. When competition is that familiar and margins are that thin, all it takes is one. They took their chance, and unfortunately we didn’t.”
With the loss, the Bobcats fell to 11-3 overall and 6-2 in NLL play. They have two regular season league matches left, beginning with a battle against first-place Springfield on Tuesday.
BG still controls its own destiny, but must at least defeat Springfield to retain a chance at an NLL Cardinal Division title.
“We still have a chance, but the margins got a little thinner,” Fox said.
Napoleon’s Andrew Gallagher delivered the winning goal with 12:56 remaining in regulation on his team’s sixth shot of the half, potentially due to a halftime adjustment from the coaching staff.
“It was a good play by us,” Gallagher said. “We worked well to get it down there. I saw the opportunity, I took it, and I got a nice goal out of it. I think we just played our hearts out. We hustled and tried our best. We knew (BG) was good, and we knew we had to play hard to beat them.”
In the first half, the Wildcats didn’t get a shot on goal against BG, which made head coach Chris DelFavero move Gallagher out wide and put Landon Speiser up top.
“I think that gave them a little different look,” DelFavero said. “Hopefully that helped us, but ultimately it’s about making a play, and Andrew made a great shot. We had gotten behind them quite a bit (before that) but just couldn’t finish, so I think it opened it up for us.”
To DelFavero’s point, Napoleon had five shots in the second half, with four going on frame, prior to Gallagher’s goal. The best look even came from Speiser, who had a great look with 30:30 left, but he sent it wide right.
Meanwhile, BG had six shots in the first 40 minutes, with five on frame. Tomas Meek had shots saved in the 12th and 14th minutes, and Austin Lewis saw a look go wide with 4:45 left.
“In the first half, I thought both teams were just feeling each other out and trying to take advantage,” DelFavero said. “I thought BG definitely had the better possession. We talked at halftime about that extra effort to get that goal. I knew defensively we’d be strong. That’s been our calling card this year, and Andrew made a heck of a shot.”
Just over two minutes into the second half, Luca Brininger’s dangerous cross for BG was stopped, and Napoleon had the game’s next four shots.
Meek had another shot saved after that, and then he was almost able to head in a ball sent in from Lewis with 22:35 left, but goalkeeper Carson Marroquin grabbed it in time.
The Bobcats also had looks in the 62nd and 64th minutes. The first of those came on a direct kick from Hayden Fox, which went high. Meek had the second look with 16:05 left, but it tantalizingly just missed.
“I thought overall the effort was good,” Fox said. “We had our chances, we just didn’t finish. At least we made them earn their goal. If you go back to the last game, we gave a couple away. We did the things we talked about, the bounces just went their way.”
Four minutes after Meek’s near goal, Gallagher struck for Napoleon (10-2-3, 5-2-2 NLL).
BG had a header from Wyatt Concannon saved with 8:15 left, along with another attempt from Meek go wide with 3:40 remaining.
“When you coach high school, it comes down to effort most of the time, and I thought our second half effort was great,” DelFavero said. “I couldn’t be more pleased. That was a nice win for us.”
Marroquin made nine saves for Napoleon, while Kole Evans had three for BG.
