McCallie coach Tony Meyers has heard the phrase before this season: “A quality win over a quality opponent.”
The phrase has been slightly different for the Notre Dame soccer team: “Close, but no cigar.”
Wednesday was no different, as the Division II top-ranked Blue Tornado toppled a tough Irish team, 2-1 at Notre Dame. McCallie scored a pair of first-half goals, but had to stave off a furious rally by the Class A/AA eighth-ranked Notre Dame, which cut the lead in half three minutes into the second half and had opportunities to tie the game late.
“When you’re up 2-0 at the half, you sometimes feel as though you’ve got it in the bag,” Meyers said. “In the second half, Notre Dame worked hard – Jim (Schermerhorn) had them prepared to play after halftime.”
The Blue Tornado (7-3-3) took a 1-0 advantage with 13 minutes to go in the half when defender Erich Lohrmann sent the ball to Arturo Rocha, who turned to his left, took a couple of dribbles and fired a low shot past Notre Dame keeper Gus Wagner.
The lead grew to 2-0 in first-half stoppage time when Rocha drove left again and chipped a cross to Garrett Hicks, who headed the ball to Drake Rustand. Rustand missed his initial shot, but the ball came back to him and he put the shot away.
“That second goal killed us,” Notre Dame coach Jim Schermerhorn said. “It really hurt because, had they not scored that, we’re down 1-0. Then we get the second half goal and it’s 1-1 – it was tough to overcome.”
Said Meyers: “When we possessed the ball, we were in control of the flow of the game. With the loss of (midfielder) Hudson Brock, we’re still trying to find our identity. I’m happy with how we played in the first – that second goal was the first scored by a midfielder.”
Possession highly favored Notre Dame in the final 40 minutes. They scored in the 43rd minute when Anthony Pagnani hit a shot from the right side that ricocheted off the left post before rolling in.
The number of opportunities were in favor of the Irish in the second half, but McCallie missed out on a prime chance when Rocha and Hudson Magee had shots on goal after Wagner came out trying to corral a ball bouncing in the box. Magee ultimately hit a shot wide.
Notre Dame (4-6-2) fell victim to another close loss, suffering their fifth loss of the season by one goal.
“We played much better in the second half,” Schermerhorn said. “We step up and showed our strength – it would be easy to fold down 2-0, but we played much better.”
McCallie (7-3-3) was able to get another good game against a state-ranked opponent – three of their seven wins and all three ties have come against the top teams.
“I like to think we’re in the top half of our division,” Meyers said. “I don’t know if we’re the top dog; we’ve had some good wins, but lost a couple of games we could have won.”