Tigers Fall Behind Early, Drop First Contest in 2008

Shane Price

GAMBIER, Ohio - Away games in college sports are always tough for the young athletes. The advantage of waking up in your own bed, eating in your own cafeteria, and getting your head straight in your home locker room is a tremendous advantage and the young athletes of the Wittenberg soccer team realized that in a 4-1 loss at Kenyon.

After a walk around Kenyon's new facilities, the Tigers' student-athletes tried to get ready for a much-anticipated game, but they wound up playing like a team with at least half their collective minds on fall break like the rest of the Wittenberg campus. The loss ended the Tigers' program-best 13-match win streak to open the 2008 season, and dropped Wittenberg into a second-place tie with Kenyon at 4-1 in the North Coast Athletic Conference (NCAC) standings.

Kenyon came out strong from the opening whistle, pressuring the reconfigured Tiger defense after injury losses of seniors Michael Hosket (Yellow Springs, Ohio/Yellow Springs) and Justin Jenkins (Dublin, Ohio/Coffman). The Tigers found themselves on the defensive early in the game, something they were unaccustomed to, and after Kenyon had missed a few opportunities, Felix Hoffmann finished a ball from Miguel Barrera to put Kenyon up 1-0. Just minutes later Kenyon put another goal in the back of the net after a contested penalty call in the Wittenberg box allowed Hoffmann a penalty kick, which he buried into the upper right hand corner of the net.

In the second half, senior Matt Borland (Kettering, Ohio/Alter) moved from sweeper, where he was attempting to replace Jenkins, back to his customary forward position to try and get the Tigers back into the game. After a strong start to the second half, Wittenberg's hopes were dashed in the 51st minute Barrera scored Kenyon's third goal to put the game out of reach. The Tigers didn't let up, exchanging goals in the last twenty minutes as Kenyon scored in the 64th minute and Wittenberg senior forward Shane Price (Minford, Ohio/Minford) scored on a header in the 79th minute.

The Tigers' second team played valiantly over the last 15 minutes of the game, even as the game ended unfavorably for the first time this season. The Tigers still came together as a team, and the loss hopefully will offer an important learning experience as Wittenberg continues a swing of road games at Earlham on Wednesday and Denison on Saturday.

For the game, Wittenberg was outshot 21-7, but each team's goalkeeper was credited with three saves. Kenyon was whistled for a whopping 18 fouls, compared to seven for Wittenberg, and each team received two yellow cards in the game.

Written By: Brenton Dawson