Cross-town rivals and played to a 1-1 tie Tuesday afternoon at Wickford Middle School.
This matchup was a tale of two totally different halves with Wickford dominating all facets of the game for the first eight minutes to get on the board, as Nick Roy sent a high corner kick into the box for teammate Austin Lind. The tall forward leaped over a defender and connected on a perfectly timed header that went just past Dragon goalie Jarod Parkins.
Lind and fellow forward Alex Overly continued to create scoring chances throughout the first half, but Parkins anchored a solid Davisville defense and kept the Wildcats from increasing their lead.
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"Jarod was outstanding all game long. We played sloppy the entire first half and were giving them far too many opportunities to score. Jarod kept us in the game," said Davisville coach Jameson Logiodice.
The Wildcats dominated the time of possession and held DMS to just three first half shots.
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"We wanted our players to play with confidence," said WMS coach Byron Lind. "We focused on getting the ball out of the middle and on our ball control."
Playing with a short bench, Coach Lind's squad seemed to fatigue in the early stages of the second half, and Davisville took full advantage. After seeing little action in the first half, Wildcat goalie Remy Leduc found himself in the thick of things. Eight minutes in, Leduc made a terrific sprawling save to conserve his team's lead on a breakaway.
"We got tired, that's the conditioning factor," said Lind. "(Davisville) subbed a lot more than us, and being a younger team, we don't have the luxury of doing that as much."
After numerous scoring chances on Leduc, Davisville finally broke through in the 41st minute. A turnover at midfield gave speedy DMS forward Ethan Scott a wide open breakaway. Leduc came out of his net to try and cut off Scott, but was unable to react in time to a low shot that found the back of the net for the equalizer.
"My message at halftime was that we had to direct our energy into good play as opposed to letting our excitement for the game turn into sloppy play," said Logiodice.
Every cross-town game is important, but with both teams within two points of each other for a playoff spot in the Southern Division, the final five minutes of this contest had amplified urgency.
"A lot of our players play with the Davisville players on club teams and they know each other. It's certainly a bragging rights game," said Lind. "We used our last ounce of energy in the final minutes today."
The 55th minute saw the best chances for both teams. Wickford's Byron Lind went in at the goal all by himself and shot straight for the bottom right hand corner of the goal. Parkins decided to stay in the net, and smothered the ball with his outstretched hands diving toward the post.
Right off of that save, Dragon forward Zach Cook got through traffic and found an opening to shoot, but his shot went inches to the outside of the side post. Cook then won a 50/50 ball and dribbled in again, this time opting to try and chip the ball softly over Leduc, but his shot hit the cross bar and Roy was able to clear it away safely.
The tie keeps the Dragons two points ahead of Wickford in the standings, good for second place in the division standings. Wickford sits in fourth at 3-1-2, two points ahead of Jamestown and one behind Narragansett Pier Middle School.
GAME NOTES:
DMS outshot WMS 9-8 for the game, after Wickford held a 5-3 advantage in the first half...Wickford started 10 8th graders and one 6th grader...These two teams will meet in SoccerFest later in the season, a fundraiser for the two teams who are not funded by the school department.
