County Kings: Lexington tops Clear Fork to finish 4-0 against Richland County rivals
BELLVILLE ― Expectation No. 1 for the Lexington boys soccer program is to be the best team in Richland County.
On Wednesday night, the Minutemen proved that without a shadow of a doubt.
With a 5-0 win over Clear Fork, the Minutemen improved to 4-0 against Richland County opponents with victories over Ontario, Madison and Mansfield Senior to go with the win over the Colts. In those four wins, the Minutemen outscored their county rivals 20-2, proving they are the kings of Richland County yet again.
"Obviously, we want to be the best team in the area, but tonight we hopefully sent a message with the tournament seeding and draw happening this weekend," Lexington coach Peter Them said. "We wanted to come out (and) solidify where we think we should be, and I challenged the boys to come out and score five goals and get a shutout just to prove that we belong where we believe we do."
Wednesday night was a loud message after the Minutemen jumped out to a 1-0 halftime lead on a goal by Zachary Turlo against Clear Fork's defensive-minded strategy. The Colts put everyone back behind midfield to clog things up and make it difficult for Lexington to connect multiple passes on its way to the goal.
It wasn't until Dylan George scored off a rebound with 35:47 left in the match before the Colts were forced to switch up the formation to see if they could get something working offensively.
"Clear Fork did what they needed to do and forced us to open it up a little bit," Them said. "In the first half, we had a lot of chances and their keeper stood on his head a couple of times and made some great saves. We just wanted to keep striking and keep fighting, and it opened up for us."
The first-half strategy worked with Connor Hauger heading up the defensive effort for the Colts, but with that came a lack of offensive threat as Hauger is the Colts' main striker.
"We had two game plans coming in and the first was to start Connor Hauger back on defense because he is a heck of a defender, but he is also our best option on offense," Clear Fork coach Nate Gailey said. "We hung in there and were getting some looks early, but we just couldn't finish on our back third.
"At halftime, we decided to go the same way, but they put that first goal of the second half in early on us and made us adjust. If you lose 2-0 or 4-0, it doesn't matter, so we move Connor back up to the top just to try and get something."
The crowded half is something the Minutemen are expecting to see when the tournament starts in a couple of weeks as lesser teams will look to steal one from Lexington in the sectional and district rounds. That made it a blessing in disguise to get some work against the opposing defensive game plan, especially against a team the quality of Clear Fork.
"That was the talk at halftime," Them said. "We know that is what will be coming down the road in the tournament, and we need to learn how to make things different. We moved some guys around and opened things up that way, but we struggled to get the ball wide at times. When we can get the ball wide, we can do a lot more things."
As the Colts changed formations, things started to open up for Lex. Will Perkins scored with a strike to the upper 90 before George added his second goal of the night. Alex Depperschmidt finished off the victory with an easy penalty kick.
The Minutemen scored five goals by four different players a night after scoring 12 in a win over West Holmes in which everyone got in on the party.
"Last night, we had 12 goals and only had two score two goals so it was spread out and more guys got involved, and we carried that over to tonight," Them said. "We had a lot of chances that we didn't get to the end of. We are getting healthy again and that is providing more options. So it is all about getting ready for the postseason."
Depperschmidt, a scorer and facilitator, took a lot of pride in finishing off the Richland County sweep. The only teams the Minutemen did not play in Richland County were Mansfield Christian and Crestview, two much smaller schools. But it was still a big deal for Depperschmidt and his teammates.
"A little bit, yeah," Depperschmidt said about if it means something to go 4-0 against Richland County opponents. "It is more of a pride thing to go out and beat the teams in the area, but it helps later on down the road when the postseason comes around."
Lexington seemed to control possession throughout while connecting multiple passes down the field. Each player understood that every movement and every action on the pitch had to mean something and a high success rate with those actions will lead to victories. It is a simple philosophy that leads to success, and the Minutemen did that to perfection Wednesday night.
"It says a lot," Depperschmidt said. "Everything we do out here has to have a purpose. We pass the ball to move opponents so we can create space, and that is what coach implies in our practices. We come out with a game plan and it is our job to come out and execute it."
The Colts (6-7) proved to themselves they can hang with anyone in the area if they put together a first-half effort as they did against Lexington. The game plan is likely going to be something the Colts implement in the tournament and could run it again against Lexington if there is a postseason meeting between the two.
"I liked our lineup and it worked well, but at the same time it is tough to stick with it when you are taking the ball off your best player's feet," Gailey said. "We saw some things we can improve on. I talked in the huddle at the end of the game and told the guys that they are a good team and we hung with them so that should tell them something. When we get in the tournament, we should be able to hang with anyone and maybe surprise some people."
The Colts have four games left to get themselves prepared for the postseason, and there is one major thing they will try to shore up before the tournament starts.
"One of the things I would like to see us work on and improve on is our possession game," Gailey said. "We got away from playing the easy ball and finding feet tonight and forced some things too much, and it led to us not having an attack because we didn't have numbers. If we can hold the attack for a minute and let it build, it should open things up for us."
Lexington (10-3-1) won its 10th game of the season, giving the program nine consecutive seasons of 10-or-more wins. The Minutemen still have two more games left to add to that total and two games to put the finishing touches on tournament preparation.
"We have two very quality opponents so we have to come out and send a message and do everything we can to make sure we are ready for the tournament," Depperschmidt said. "It all starts with finishing better. We still leave a lot of opportunities out there so we need to finish those chances if we hope to have a successful tournament run."
Them agreed.
"The biggest thing I think will be when we make a long road trip to Toledo St. John's Jesuit, which is a nice Division I program, and it will be all about seeing if we can make the road trip and go out and take care of a quality opponent," he said. "Then we have a home game to end things, so can we stay focused and stick to the game plan and do what we need to do?"
Lexington makes that trip on Saturday while Clear Fork travels to Crestview on the same night.
jfurr@gannett.com
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This article originally appeared on Mansfield News Journal: Lexington Minutemen beat Clear Fork Colts in high school boys soccer
