It’s time for the district playoffs in boys soccer and nobody is more ready for them than Northwest head coach Dave Willis, who can be forgiven for his single-mindedness.
“It’s not district soccer unless it’s Northwest against Jackson,” Willis said.
That’s been true for the last seven years. The Indians are 5-1 against Northwest in the last six district meetings with the Lions beating Jackson for the Class 4 District 1 title in 2019. Jackson eliminated Northwest in the 2020 district final on the way to its first state crown.
The seventh consecutive meeting is in the first round of the District 1 tournament at Lindbergh on Saturday. It’s not the first time this season the two nonconference schools more than 100 miles apart have met. The Indians (17-2), the No. 3 seed, shut out the sixth-seeded Lions (12-11) 3-0 in September at Jackson.
“We missed a breakaway very early and had we (scored), maybe the outcome would have been different,” Willis said. “It was a good game until late. They play extremely hard and are well coached and they’re always a tough matchup.”
Unless Northwest goes deep into the playoffs, its seven-year streak of boasting at least one 20-goal scorer will end. Seniors Gage Pytlinski and Luke Licare lead the team with 11 and 10 goals respectively.
Since Willis moved Pytlinski from the backfield to forward, the Lion offense is generating more chances and scoring more goals. Pytlinski netted a hat trick against Fox in his first start at forward, and last week, Northwest sandwiched 3-0 shutouts over Parkway North and Poplar Bluff around a 2-1 loss to Eureka and Pytlinski scored six of the seven Lion goals to take the team lead.
“Gage is a big body, has a high IQ and is highly skilled,” Willis said. “Luke has been our guy and it gives him another option (for scoring).
“We’re starting to play our best soccer since we moved Gage to striker and that changed things for us. Scoring had been a struggle most of the season and we had relied on our defense for victories.”
Pytlinski’s move put more responsibility on freshman Andrew Johnson and sophomores Nathan Finder and Jack Lato to hold the fort on defense. But when you’ve got a 6-6 goalie who’s one of the best in the state (senior Alex Drexler), you can afford to tinker with your back line. Drexler holds the school record for career shutouts (36) and wins (62) and it will always amaze me how Willis kept him from the clutches of the private schools in St. Louis.
“Alex is a big reason we’re able to make that (Pytlinski) move,” Willis said. “Alex has carried a large part of the load and he’s won us some games. It’s district time and goals are at a premium.”
Seckman (12-11), the No. 7 seed in District 1, had won four games in a row going into its match with host Fox (8-14-1) on Monday, after the Leader deadline. Fox is the eighth and last seed. I’ve seen both teams play and their seeding tells you what they’re up against. Metro Catholic Conference power Vianney (16-5-1) is the No. 1 seed and plays Fox at home Saturday. Also that day, Seckman faces host Lindbergh (17-5), the No. 2 seed.
“The seeding was tough because there were five teams that could have made an argument to be No. 1,” Willis said. “The district’s pretty wide open. It wouldn’t surprise me for a No. 4 or 5 seed to upset the top seed in the second round.”
Talk about frosting on the cake, Lion senior Phoenix Moreno scored a goal against Poplar Bluff on his 18th birthday. Happy belated birthday, Phoenix!
And hearty congratulations go out to Hillsboro senior Nick Marchetti, the new career goal scoring and points leader for the Hawks. Marchetti has 89 goals and 206 points in his four-year career while also moonlighting as the kicker for the football team. Marchetti has booted 124 extra points and a field goal and even ran in a two-point conversion.
“His combination of speed and strength is something I won’t see again for a while,” Hillsboro soccer head coach Sam Nansel said in what might be the coaching understatement of the season.
I watched Marchetti kick into the net on the sideline before and during the Hawks’ football game against Cardinal Ritter earlier this month. Repetition and practice are what make him so proficient.
Nansel said it’s the same on the pitch.
“It doesn’t matter how many goals he scores, he’s the one who will stick around and work on his finishing,” Nansel said.
Finishing – that’s what the next few weeks are all about for fall sports. The season has flown by since I started preparing previews of each sport back in early August. The prep softball season in the county ended with a whimper as none of our schools made it to a district championship game. At 25-5, Hillsboro had a great team but lost to another one in Cape Notre Dame in the semifinal round.
I’ll be on the trail the next two Saturdays following our cross country teams to Gans Creek in Columbia. Then hopefully we’ll be eating Thanksgiving dinner and talking around the table about going back to Columbia (Faurot Field) the following week for a couple of state championship football games.