By RICK PETERSON
TopSports.news
Washburn Rural soccer coach Brian Hensyel had several reasons to be concerned entering Tuesday's non-league game against Kapaun Mt. Carmel.
Washburn Rural senior Liam Morrison (24) scored Tuesday's first goal in a 2-0 non-league home win over Kapaun Mt. Carmel. [Photo by Doug Walker/Special to TSN]
Washburn Rural senior Liam Morrison (24) celebrates his goal in Tuesday's 2-0 non-league home win over Kapaun Mt. Carmel. [Photo by Doug Walker/Special to TSN]
First of all, Rural was facing a good Crusader team that had won six straight games.
Secondly, the Junior Blues were coming off a road trip to Iowa, where they played three hotly-contested games in three days.
And Washburn Rural would also face Kapaun without two of its top players, senior leading scorer Dylan Willingham and juior Brodye Kocher-Munoz.
But Rural put all of Hensyel's concerns to rest with one of its best performances of the season en route to a 2-0 shutout over the Crusaders at McElroy Field.
"This is as good of a win as we've had all season and all of those things add in,'' Hensyel said. "Obviously, we just played Thursday, Friday, Saturday against high-level competition and yesterday was pretty much a non-practice day to be honest. We were just trying to rest up.
"And with Dylan out with his ankle and a guy out with a redcard, you're down your two starting forwards, so we had to play with a more defensive emphasis in the second half. We thought we could score off set plays and we did, so we got the lead and then we were able to be strong defensively and our defense was really good.''
Senior Liam Morrison scored the only goal the Junior Blues would need at the 29:15 mark of the first half off a free kick assist from senior Brandon Hamilton.
Washburn Rural senior Higgins Hawks (21) scored Rural's second goal in Tuesday's 2-0 non-league home win over Kapaun Mt. Carmel. [Photo by Doug Walker/Special to TSN]
Rural, now 8-1-1, added its final goal of the night with 16:38 remaining in the opening half when senior Higgins Hawks scored off an assist from senior Brady Loeffler.
Senior Miles Cook (99) picked up the shutout in goal in Washburn Rural's 2-0 non-league home win over Kapaun Mt. Carmel. [Photo by Doug Walker/Special to TSN]
The Junior Blues were unable to find the back of the net the remainder of the game, but Rural's defense was able to keep 7-3-0 Kapaun off the scoreboard as senior Miles Cook registered the shutout in goal.
Washburn Rural will return to action next Tuesday, hosting Bishop Carroll.
"Right now we're playing pretty high-level soccer, but our goal is we want to play as many home games as possible in the playoffs, so we want to keep stacking wins,'' Hensyel said.
WASHBURN RURAL 2, KAPAUN MT. CARMEL 0
Kapaun Mt. Carmel (7-3-0) 0 0 -- 0
Washburn Rural (8-1-1) 2 0 -- 2
Washburn Rural -- Goals: Liam Morrison, Higgins Hawks. Assists: Brandon Hamilton, Brady Loeffler. Shutout: Miles Cook.
