Co-op boys soccer ties Lone Peak 1-1
Nathanial Palacios, a sophomore left wing for the Thompson Falls Blue Hawks varsity soccer team goes after a loose ball during the Hawks first ever varsity soccer game this Saturday afternoon at Previs Field in T-Falls. (Chuck Bandel/VP-MI)
On a bright, blue-sky day with temperatures hovering in the low 90s and upper 80s, a group of high school athletes were part of history on a field in Thompson Falls.
It was there, at Thompson Falls’ Previs Field that soccer came to Sanders County as an official high school sanctioned varsity sport.
A combination of athletes from T Falls, Plains and St. Regis high schools congregated before a small but vocal group of fans to play the first varsity soccer games in county history.
The Blue Hawks and Lady Blue Hawks as the co-op boys and girls team are called, took on Lone Peak High from Big Sky, Montana with mixed but welcome results for soccer fans.
The boys tied Lone Pine 1-1 as the Bighorns scored on a straight in shot that knotted the score at one with just over five minutes left in regulation play.
A penalty kick awarded to Lone Pine sailed above the net, manned admirably throughout the hot afternoon by Landin Baird, a sophomore for the three-town Blue Hawks. Baird spent a substantial part of his afternoon fully stretched out and flying through the summer air stopping several shots before the shot that tied the score found the back of the net.
Blue Hawks’ senior William Granda, a center and defender, scored the first varsity goal in team history in the first half, giving the home team a 1-0 lead which they aggressively protected throughout the afternoon.
Until fateful shot, that is.
Lone Peak, playing in its fifth season of varsity soccer, finished last year with a 9-2-3 record and returned a strong nucleus from that team. But the local boys have also been part of success, many of them having spent a few years playing with the Clark Fork Soccer Alliance, one of the driving forces behind bringing soccer to the area as a high school varsity sport.
The two teams waged a heated battle throughout the two 40-minute halves they played, with several hard collisions that drew at least two yellow cards and several mid-match admonishments from the referring crew.
Saturday’s game was the only scheduled meeting between the two teams, who may very well collide again in post season play.
Next up for the Thompson Falls boys, as well as the girls team, is a match this Tuesday (Sept 3) against Polson, also scheduled for the pitch in Thompson Falls.
The girls also established history Friday.
“You should all be excited to play in the first varsity soccer match in this area”, said Lady Hawks head coach Nicholas Lawyer, a leader of the CFSA for several years.
Thompson Falls fell behind the visitors from Lone Peak in the opening minutes of the first half and found themselves in a 6-0 hole but the end of the half. They wound up falling to Lone Peak by a score of 10-0 in a match that was halted due to soccer's 10-point rule that stops play when one team falls 10 points behind.
They had a few solid shots on goal, and showed signs of being a solid team, but they could not stop the Lady Bighorns’ potent offensive attack. Lone Peak returned several players from last year’s 6-3-3 team.
Both boys and girls Blue Hawks team are pretty much an equal mix of Plains and Thompson Falls players, with at least one from St. Regis.