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Area soccer teams hope success continues in second half of season
The 2021 soccer season is halfway through and each team in the Southeast Missourian’s coverage area is state-ranked.
Notre Dame (12-1) came in at No. 2 in this week’s Missouri Soccer Coaches Association power rankings, continuing its tradition of success on the pitch. The Bulldogs have won eight straight games, shut out six teams this season and their only loss came early in the year against defending Class 4 state champion Jackson.
“I’m just very proud and happy with how hard they’re working and how successful they are not only on it, but off the field working well together,” Notre Dame coach Matt Vollink said. “I think our seniors are great leaders, and so it allows that to kind of trickle-down. A lot of younger kids are following that leadership on and off the field and I think it is making us successful.”
The Bulldogs — Class 3 state runners up last year — are led offensively by Will Dodson who has 27 goals on the season. Dodson — who was already Notre Dame’s career leader in goals entering the season with 54 — is on pace to break his single-season scoring record of 34 goals.
“I think everyone is playing well and Dodson is able to do the things he does because of the seniors and because of everybody else that is kind of helping the dynamic of the whole team,” Vollink said. “If one person’s successful it’s usually because you have the other 10 right behind them.”
Jackson (8-2-1) is dealing with multiple injuries this season but is still finding success on the field despite its difficult schedule. The Indians recently dropped from No. 4 in Class 4 to No. 15.
“All around our players have done pretty well,” Indians coach Zack Walton said. “I’ve been pretty impressed with the way they’ve been able to handle the situation with so many injuries. They don’t put their heads down. It is what it is and we’ve got to play with what we’ve got. We’re going to play as hard as we can.
“That’s what I really love about these boys, that’s just the way they look at things. They say, ‘It is what it is, and we’ve just got to play hard.”
The defending state champion Indians — led in scoring by senior Deonta Blair who has 11 goals on the season — picked up wins against Saxony Lutheran and Cape Central, and gave Notre Dame its only loss of the year. Jackson has lost just two games and tied one this season.
“I think everybody wants to say that that’s one of our biggest goals is to try to get kids healthy,” Walton said. “We’ve got a great athletic training program at Jackson and those guys work really hard with our players to get them back. That’s one of our big goals, and we’ve got some big conference games coming up so we want to try to get them healthy so we can play well and do well in our conference.”
Saxony Lutheran (8-3) has found itself in the middle of its toughest stretch of the year, playing in the Saint Louis University High Jr. Billiken’s Classic this week and matching up with Cape Central and Perryville next week. The Crusaders moved up from the No. 7 spot to No. 5 this week.
“This week we’re kind of in the midst of one of the toughest tournaments in Missouri,” Crusaders coach Chris Crawford said. “Every team that we’re playing is ranked in the top 10 in their class, and then we come back and have Central and Perryville who both have really good squads. We’re kind of right in the middle of the thick of as tough as our schedule is going to get right now. I’m just looking forward to seeing how we compete through it.”
Jace Boland and Max Richey pace the Crusaders’ offense with 16 and 13 goals, respectively. Boland also leads the team in assists with 11.
“We have a much better offense than I thought we did and we were a little bit more gritty than I realized we were,” Crawford said. “I knew we had some of that but I didn’t realize how much we had.”
Perryville (11-1) remains locked in the No. 3 spot in Class 3 and is on an eight-game winning streak of its own.
The Pirates are led offensively by Dayton Strattman and Bryce Brewer who have 26 and 24 goals respectively. Strattman also leads Perryville in assists with 21.
Cape Central (8-1-1) came in at No. 11 in Class 3 again this week. The Tigers haven’t lost a game since their season opener against Jackson on Sept. 2.
The Tigers are led offensively by leading scorers Jon Brandtner, Tim Kirby and Preston McCuan.