The Edwardsville Tigers did not.
Sam Garafalo and Trey Peterson scored first-half goals to lift Collinsville to a 2-0 win over Edwardsville in the Southwestern Conference opener for both teams on Tuesday inside the District 7 Sports Complex.
“We always talk about finishing our chances. I think every soccer coach talks about that. We were lucky enough for Sam Garafalo to hit a great shot and then get that second goal,” Collinsville coach Robert Lugge said.
Edwardsville falls to 3-1.
“Knowing going in, Collinsville has one of the best teams it has had in quite some time,” EHS coach Mark Heiderscheid said. “We didn’t face that many shots, but they were so clinical and all of the sudden the shots that we faced went in.”
Collinsville is now 3-0.
The Kahoks are off to their best start since opening the 2019 season 7-0-1. They went on to finish third at the Class 3A state tournament.
It was also the second win at Edwardsville in successive seasons. Prior to last year’s win, Collinsville hadn’t won on the road over EHS since 2008.
“Winning against Edwardsville is hard. Winning here is even harder,” Lugge said. “Getting this win in the first game of the conference is a huge momentum builder.”
Collinsville didn’t take long to grab a lead.
Less than seven minutes into the first half, Peterson was able to slot a ball through to Garafalo, who hit a brilliant shot into the top right corner of the goal for the 1-0 lead. It was his first goal of the season.
Peterson scored his own goal in the 31st minute to make it 2-0. After Collinsville won a 50-50 ball at midfield, the Kahoks worked the ball up to Peterson and he was able to slide a shot past a charging Edwardsville keeper Zeke Manning. It was the second goal of the season for Peterson.
“Early in the first half, they controlled it a lot better than us,” Heiderscheid said. “In the second half, we did a much better job of connecting and creating.”
The Tigers were able to find a better pace in the second half, but they had little to show for it against a stingy Collinsville defense that has allowed just two goals this year. Tuesday was its second straight shutout.
“You are always on edge and hoping they don’t get that opportunity. Our backline played great. If it wasn’t for the four of them, as well as our keeper Nick Horras, it might have been different,” Lugge said. “Our main goal is constantly getting shutouts and playing hard defense from our forwards to our keeper.”
The biggest scoring chances came late for the Tigers when Evan Moore ripped a shot just wide and Owen Logan put a header just over the crossbar in the waning minutes.
Heiderscheid thought both of those chances were going to be goals.
“We created five or six decent chances, where I honestly thought one or two of them went in,” Heiderscheid said.
It was the first time EHS had been shut out in a regular-season home game since a 0-0 tie to CBC on Oct. 12, 2019. Edwardsville lost 1-... Click here to read full article
ARTICLE SOURCE:
