By Jeremy McDonald
Jeremymcdonald73@gmail.com
ALBANY, Ore.– The West Albany Boys Soccer team were back to work Monday evening when they hosted Willamette in their fourth game of the young season.
Coming off of their tough 2-1 victory over Ashland on Saturday, it took a while for the Bulldogs to find their rhythm. This tough non-league slate that featured Summit, the Grizzlies a few days ago and now the Wolverines are preparing the West Albany squad for what is expecting to be another tough season in the Mid-Willamette Conference and a push for the 5A State Title later this season.
Bulldogs Head Coach Kevin Branigan holds his team to that high standard. To be a playoff team, be in the hunt for the League and the State Title every, dang, year. And with their defensive back third inexperienced, it has helped them get up to speed and to the standard that the West Albany coach has laid out for them.
“The test is the most important. It’s a really good test. It’s good for these guys to go through these tests, especially being young and inexperienced,” said Branigan. “We should be a perennial playoff team, always in the hunt for the State Title, League Title. It’s who we want to be. We try to load up the best that we can in the non-league.”
After shaking off any leftover bus legs from their trip to Southern Oregon and getting a feel of the 6A Wolverines, West Albany began to find their groove to start the second half. For about the first 15 minutes of the second half, they controlled the possession and created opportunities on the offensive half of the field but couldn’t execute.
It was 0-0 at this point. And the clearest shot either team had at breaking the gridlock was back in the opening 40 minutes when both the Bulldogs and Wolverines saw shots ricocheting off one of the poles and back into the field of play instead of taking a favorable roll into the back of the net.
Willamette was able to give their defense some breathing room following the initial burst of intensity by West Albany, eventually breaking the 0-0 tie in the 65th minute.
But the Wolverine lead was short-lived.
Roughly three minutes later, Julian Romero knotted the game up at one. Re-energized, the Bulldogs dug deep and found the go-ahead goal with 3:35 left in the game by way of Johan Rodriguez with the assist going to Romero. The goal helped the West Albany squad take the game 2-1 and improve to 3-0-1 on the year.
“We found a way to get back in the second half and do what we wanted to do is awesome,” said Branigan.
“We all wanted to win, and though we were all tired from Saturday, we gave it our all at the end. Coach also told us to put out everything, so I think that brought us up, and we got a lot of energy there at the end,” said Romero. “I think we’ve done an amazing job (this preseason) by playing team ball and everyone with the energy. We’re putting in all the effort. We want to win the State Title, and we’re working for it.”
West Albany closes out their non-league slate Saturday at Central Catholic before jumping into MWC play on September 30 at Crescent Valley. The Bulldogs return home on October 2 against Silverton.
Photos By Jeremy McDonald
