Calhoun shows off balance, depth in big region win
Jackets have six different goal scorers vs. LFO; Calhoun girls win 3-0
Aside from a couple momentary lapses, Calhoun dominated their region opener against LFO on Thursday night, and several different Jackets got in on the action.
Calhoun scored in several different ways and had six different players total record goals in a 10-2 victory over the Warriors.
Leading the way for Calhoun ( 5- 2, 1- 0) was Jorge Oranda who scored four goals and had one assist. Daniel Isep added two goals and two assists, and Walker Izara, Luis Smith, Oscar Huerta and Brandon Barrios all contributed single goals. Alex Aguilar had two assists, and Izara added one.
Calhoun coach Matt Rice said his team has come together early on in the season and that showed in Thursday’s win.
“Coming into the season, we knew we didn’t have a lot of experience back, but I knew we still had good players… they just haven’t had a chance to play yet,” said Rice. “We’ve been trying to get everyone on the same page and focusing on team wins and team losses. When we play as a team, we’re a lot better. I think we’ve got a strong unit as a whole and have a lot of depth. That showed tonight with six different goal scorers. And that’s the thing with our guys is they don’t care as much about individual success…they just want the team to be successful. I’m proud of them. We need to keep that mindset to be as good as we can be.”
The Jackets took a quick 2-0 lead with goals by Izara and Aranda in the first five minutes, but LFO cut the deficit in half with a score in the seventh minute.
Calhoun didn’t hang their heads, however, as they dominated possession for the rest of the first half and tacked on four more goals to lead 6-1 at the half. Scoring in that span for the Jackets was Aranda twice to give him the hat trick as well as Smith and Huerta.
After scoring again in the opening minutes of the second half to make it 7-1 with Isep finishing his first of two goals on the night, the Warriors once again found the back of the net in the 51st minute. Calhoun finished strong from there with three goals from Isep, Aranda and Barrios for the 10-2 victory.
Rice said his team played well for the majority of the game, but they’ve got to learn from their few mistakes.
“We talked about it after the game that I think we played about 77 or 78 good minutes, but we had a few little lulls there,” said Rice. “And when you give good goal scorers an opportunity, they’re going to hurt you. We let down for just a little and got a little lax, and that’s something we’ve got to improve on. Hopefully we’ll learn that lesson.”
The Jackets have now won three in a row after a 2-2 start. Rice said his team has improved since the beginning of the season, and he hopes they will continue that improvement.
“I think we’re a good team,” said Rice. “We’ve got some talented individuals, but our strength lies in our team play. When we’re helping each other and working together, we’re a strong unit. When we lose that, we suffer.
“We struggled with possession early on so we’re constantly working on that. We’ve got to maintain possession and make good decisions. We’ll continue to work on that and try to play fundamental soccer. We’ve got to do that to be successful.”
The Jackets were back home on Tuesday to host Baylor (Tenn.). ( For details on that game, see Saturday’s Calhoun Times.) They will visit Murray County on March 21 at 7 p.m. in their next region game.
In the Calhoun-LFO girls game earlier on Thursday:
Calhoun 3, LFO 0
The Lady Jackets had a tough time getting scoring opportunities in the first half, but their patience paid off with three goals in the second half to earn a shutout victory in their region opener.