By SPENCER BATES
SALAMANCA — After dropping its third straight game to start the season, the Salamanca boys soccer team is looking to string together the positives moving forward.
The Warriors fell to Chautauqua Lake 7-1 on Sept. 9, in a game in which they had their moments, but by the time they found their stride, the score had run away from them.
Both sides got off to a hot start offensively, with the Eagles finding the back of the net first, firing home after an initial shot was saved by Salamanca goalkeeper Carter Light — who tallied eight saves over the course of the fixture. But the Warriors’ heads did not fall in the immediate aftermath. Instead, just two minutes later, they found the equalizer courtesy of Calum Farnum.
But the tie was short-lived as Chautauqua Lake struck three more times in the 14 minutes that followed.
“We’ve been a second half team for the last three games,” Salamanca head coach Marra Stokes said. “Once we have that halftime talk, they really buy-in and get motivated. We’re just really working hard to be a first-half team. This is the first game that we scored in the first half in a very long time. So we are proud of that, and we’re going to just keep bringing the intensity.”
Through the first three games of their new campaign, the Warriors have been out-scored 21-6, with the goal against the Eagles being the first they’ve netted in the first half of any of those games. This is an area that Stokes and her assistant coach JC McAuley have identified as key if they want to make sure their team is prepared to compete down the stretch.
“We got to turn the second half into the first half,” McAuley said. “If they buy into it in the beginning of the game, we’re going to be that team come playoff time that you’re not going to want to face.”
Salamanca’s Easton Chudy (3) prepares to send a free kick in the direction of the Chautauqua Lake penalty area. (Spencer Bates)
Chautauqua Lake scored once more before the half, putting the visitors up 5-1. The score didn’t get any closer for Salamanca after the interval, but what pleased Stokes and McAuley was how much their side grew into the game. The Eagles netted just two goals in the second half compared to the five they did in the first, both coming in the final eight minutes of the contest. That level of resilience Stokes chalks up to the leadership she has seen from her veteran players.
“We’re seeing a lot of leadership with our juniors, primarily,” Stokes said. “There’s a lot of them that are three-year varsity players, and they’ve been leading these younger boys. We do have two eighth graders that we brought up to varsity … and there’s been a lot of mentorship from the older guys. The younger ones are learning a lot, and they’re pushing themselves to that varsity level.”
Ultimately, it is not the final scoreline that Stokes and McAuley want their players to take away from this game. Instead it is the 32 minutes of second-half action that they want to take forward. It’s just a matter of finding a way to take that positive stretch of minutes and extend it to a full-game effort.
“It’s never over, as long as they put in the time and keep grinding throughout the whole game, good things happen,” McAuley said. “We just have to tie the front end and the back end together and just not be one-ended. But I think they’re starting to understand that if they keep grinding and keep working hard … they’ll come out strong in the end.”
Salamanca’s next chance to grab its first win of the season will come on Sept. 11 when it hosts Pioneer. Kickoff for that game is set for 5 p.m.
