Lc Gets Top Seed To State
Soccer
The Lake City boys soccer team will enter the state tournament as the No. 1 seed from District 1 after defeating cross-town rival Coeur d’Alene 6-3 in the district championship match Friday.
“This is the first time ever that we’ve gone to state as the first seed,” said LC coach Jim Facciano. “The boys played really well tonight. I’m very encouraged about our possibilities down in Boise and I have very high hopes.”
The state tournament opens Thursday in Boise. CdA goes as the No. 2 seed and Sandpoint, a 9-0 winner over Lakeland, will be the No. 3 seed. LC will face a No. 3 seed, CdA a No. 2 seed and Sandpoint a No. 1 seed in firstround matches.
The Timberwolves took a 3-0 first-half lead as they dominated the ball by evading CdA with passes. The Vikings managed only one shot at goal the first half.
LC’s Connor Quinn, a junior midfielder, scored three goals, two coming in the first half. Senior forward Brian Landers scored two for the Timberwolves.
Quinn’s first came 38 minutes into the game when Viks goalie Barret Schwerin stepped out to challenge him and fell, leaving a wide-open net. His second came 6 minutes later. Teammate J.J. Barlow set him up 10 yards out with a header pass. Quinn followed suit by heading the ball into the net. He booted his third, volleying in a corner kick early in the second half. All came within 12 minutes.
“Connor is one of my strongest players,” said Facciano. “He kept his head tonight and played with some composure, which really makes a difference. And he’s such a universal player. I’m extremely happy when a midfielder can come up and score three goals.”
CdA found success the second half by turning around its performance from the first half. Jeff Waggoner found himself open in front of the net to knock in an assist from Kyle Chambers.
Waggoner headed in another goal later on.
“They came out fired up, which didn’t surprise me,” said Facciano. “I was doing some subbing because this is our only game before Boise. I wanted to try to do a little team building.
“When I started subbing is when they started scoring. So I went ahead and started putting the guys back in that are used to playing together and then we picked it back up again.”
“We’re starting to jell together as a team now,” said Connor. “We were trying to get things worked out this game. We knew how our players were working and we knew how to play on the ball. We’ll be ready to play (at state). We’ll have to suck it up and play better than ever” against state opponents.
Sandpoint 9, Lakeland 0
Mike Beyers scored the first three goals of the first half to jump-start the Bulldogs in the rout over the Hawks.
Shane Thoreson scored the last goal of the first half and the first goal of the second half to help secure the win over Lakeland. The Hawks had just four shots on goal compared to 22 for the Bulldogs.
, DataTimes