All signs point to a sixth consecutive title game between Daviess County and Owensboro, but neither team is looking that far ahead as they begin play in the 3rd Region boys’ soccer tournament hosted at Owensboro Catholic.
The Red Devils play Meade County on Monday at 6 p.m. in the tournament opener and would advance to Tuesday’s 6 p.m. semifinal against Ohio County with a win.
The Panthers earned a bye straight to a 7:30 p.m. Tuesday semifinal, where they’ll face the winner of Monday’s 7:30 p.m. matchup between Grayson County and Muhlenberg County.
Owensboro (15-5-2, 9th District runner-up) will be heavy favorites against the Green Wave (2-15-2, 11th District runner-up), but head coach Ryan Haley said he isn’t taking any team lightly after nearly being upset by Meade County a season ago in the first round of region.
“They can be easily overlooked,” he said. “Last year we made that mistake and they took us to a PK shootout. It was my first year, and I learned a valuable lesson. This year we’re not taking anyone for granted. We’re going to make sure the opponent ahead of us is the one we’re focused on.”
Owensboro’s only two losses to region opponents came against DC this season — including a double overtime thriller in last week’s 9th District championship. Haley said there’s still plenty of room to improve, and he’s hoping they’ll have a chance to be the last team standing.
“I think we can definitely play better, specifically on offense,” he said. “I thought with all of our offensive weapons, we didn’t do a good enough job getting in position to score (in the district championship). We’re looking to clean up some of our mistakes and get better as long as we’re able to play.”
The only region loss for Daviess County (16-2-2, 9th District champion) came against Owensboro during the regular season.
Head coach Doug Sandifer said his team could also clean up their game a bit, as they couldn’t finish on a handful of opportunities in regulation of last week’s title game. He’s hoping they’ll continue to execute since there’s no more room for error.
“We constantly talk to our guys about how it’s one game at a time and every game at this point in the year is an elimination game,” Sandifer said. “We’ll talk about putting those chances away no matter who you’re playing.”
The main focus will be on the other end of the field, though, as Sandifer said the Panthers rely on their defense for success.
“Our main thing this year has been doing our jobs defensively as a team, everybody playing within the system,” he said. “Defense is our first priority. We feel like offensively we’ll get opportunities.”
Ohio County (14-6-2, 10th District champion) is likely the biggest competition in the field, though they lost to both Owensboro and DC in the regular season. The Panthers (24), Red Devils (30) and Eagles (32) allowed the fewest goals in the region on the season. Similarly, OHS had the most goals with 77, while DC and Ohio County tied with 73.
Grayson County (12-6-2) went 3-0 to win the 11th District, while Muhlenberg County (5-14-1) went 0-3 and was runner-up in the 10th District.
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2019 soccer coverage is presented by Worth Insurance Group.
