Terre Haute North shuts out Northview to start season | Brazil Times
Northview’s girls soccer team fell behind Terre Haute North less than two minutes into Tuesday night’s season opener.
The Lady Knights surrendered eight more goals in the first half, leading to a 9-0 loss.
But despite that, Northview head coach Don Bryan, who acknowledged that the annual opening game against the Patriots has been difficult for his group over the last several years, walked away with some optimism with what he saw out of his group, especially in the second half.
“The effort was there but we just didn’t have everything together quite yet,” said Bryan. “It’s always a tough game, especially opening up the season, against them. I still liked what I saw at certain points. A lot of the underclassmen did some good things. The seniors were fine, which we figured they would be. No one hung their heads or gave up. We know this game is no easy task.”
What made things difficult for the Knights was the consistent pressure the host Patriots offense put on their defense throughout the evening.
Northview was held without a shot or a shot on goal until the final minutes of the first half while Terre Haute North moved the ball across midfield and into Northview territory time and time again, leading to several goals being scored – Terre Haute North scored its second, third and fourth goals in a two-minute time period and then scored its fifth and sixth goals less than one minute apart from each other – in a short amount of time.
“We talked a little before the game about how do we address the pressure they’re going to put on us, but it’s something that we have to experience to learn from because we know we’re going to see other teams like this at some point,” Bryan said. “The adjustments we made defensively in the second half helped.”
Afterwards, Bryan huddled his group up and told them to flush what took place on the field Tuesday.
With it being the first game of the fall and several starters sidelined with injuries, things will only get better, he told them. And if the Knights can stick together and learn from the loss to Terre Haute North, Bryan expects things will turn around in a hurry for the maroon and black.
“This doesn’t define anything for the rest of our season,” said Bryan. “We will send a bunch of girls onto JV at Terre Haute South tomorrow, which will be good to get them more time on the field, and get some rest for the others. We’re going to keep plugging along.”