The inaugural season of high school boys’ soccer ended on Wednesday evening for Greene County with a Class 1A Substate 1 loss to Kuemper Catholic (Carroll) in Denison. Both meetings with the Knights this season resulted in one goal losses for the Rams, who finish with a 10-9 record under the direction of head coach Carl Behne and assistant Chad Black. The Knights advance to Saturday’s substate final with a 13-7 mark.
The Rams out shot the Knights, but could not put enough of their attempts between the posts. Kuemper never trailed, although the margin was never more than one goal. Just 19 seconds into the match, Kuemper’s Victor Sibellos scored to make it 1-0. The Rams tied it 1-1 on a Leo Marques goal with 25:28 to play in the first half. The goal was Leo’s thirty-sixth of the season. He thought he had another, but it was disallowed for being off side.
The Knights took a 2-1 lead with 5:53 to go in had one on a Connor Stoelk goal, but the Rams tied it 2-2 with 3:55 to play in the opening half on a Junior Gutierrez goal, his nineteenth.
The lone goal scored in the second half was scored by Kuemper’s Caden Pedelty with 15:40 to play. The Rams had several scoring chances down the stretch, but could get none of them to land in the net. One was off the left post, and the ball deflected to where the Rams kicked it again and the ball sailed too high. Another attempt was just wide left with 2:40 to go and with 1:07 yo play, Marques was contacted on shot, which missed. No penalty was called, and the match was stopped, so he had to leave the game due to injury and sat out the final 1:)7.
Coach Behne reports the Rams had 13 shots and 11 shots on goal. Goal keeper Kyle Peters recorded 16 save.