Clover holds off Fort Mill rally to advance in boys’ soccer Saturday

An aggressive Clover Blue Eagles boys soccer team opened the game controlling the first half and held off a Fort Mill Yellow Jackets second half rally to win 3-2 and advance to the Upper State championship next Tuesday.

“A 2-0 lead in soccer is never comfortable,” said Clover head coach Graham Stafford. “We dug deep to come back and for me to see them get that third goal showed a lot of heart and character.”

The past two contests during the 2016 regular season saw each game go into penalty kicks, so it was expected if nothing else, the game would be a tight one between the two Region III foes.

During those contests, the two teams split with the score each time being 2-1 for the winner.

Neither team was able to gain much of an advantage to open things up, but Clover did a better job at controlling possession and getting shots off on throw-ins keeping Fort Mill keeper sophomore Gavin McCraw on his toes.

However the Fort Mill defense made up for any offense it lacked through the first part of the first half. The Jackets were able to crowd the box for the most part as they held Clover at bay.

Offensively, Fort Mill did get a couple good looks at the goal, but Clover sophomore keeper Austin Gunnels was just as ready to stop the Jackets’ attempts.

All those shot attempts finally paid off for Clover as junior Adam Watkins scored in the 30th minute of the first half to put the Blue Eagles on top of a match they were already controlling.

In the second half, the Jackets were the ones that were the aggressor and came out controlling the ball to open getting off a corner kick early on from junior Aaron Koch to no avail.

Although they were playing better in the second half, Fort Mill made a major mistake as McCraw was drawn out of goal giving junior Parker Largen the ability to head the ball in an open goal to put Clover up 2-0.

Turning point

Clover was able to keep battling and again regained the lead with about 10 minutes to go in the game as junior Brandon Laforge put the Blue Eagles ahead. This again forced Fort Mill to have to play from behind and try to rally, which it could not do for a third time.

Critical

After going down 2-0, Fort Mill was able to come right back and score within the next minute to again cut the Blue Eagles lead in half at 2-1 on a goal from senior Jeremy LaPointe.

Fort Mill stayed on the attack and although it took a while, they were able to battle back and tie the game at 2-2 as senior Ivan Castillo knocked the ball in with a header off a corner kick from Koch.

Star contributions

The Blue Eagles had three different players to score goals, while Fort Mill had two players score.

Overheard

Stafford said he doesn’t care who they play next week in the Upper State championship, despite having already seen Nation Ford twice this year.

“At this stage, you have to run down the best teams,” he said. “It doesn’t matter who we face.”

Box score

Clover 3, Fort Mill 2

Records

Fort Mill 13-10-1, Clover 18-6-1

On Deck

Clover will play the winner of the Nation Ford-Wade Hampton match on Tuesday in the Upper State championship.

This story was originally published May 7, 2016 at 7:08 PM with the headline "Clover holds off Fort Mill rally to advance in boys’ soccer Saturday."