10/18/2012: Meadville 3- Conneaut 2
CONNEAUT MEN'S SOCCER BLOG
By Ryan Kozlowski, Assistant Men's Soccer Coach
The Conneaut boys (9-5-2) felt confident that they would have an easy time with Meadville at home for Senior Night.
They beat Meadville 2-1 earlier in the year at Meadville's Bender Field and Conneaut appeared to be on a role while Meadville at 2-13 were not.
But, while everything came to Conneaut easily yesterday against Commodore Perry, the Eagles looked out of sorts against the Bulldogs and struggled.
Freshman standout Cottrell McDonald for Meadville got the Bulldogs going with a goal 15 minutes in and would get a second late in the game to lead the Bulldogs to a 3-2 win.
Meadville went up 2-nil at half.
The second half started off well enough for Conneaut; as Eagles senior Josh Betts strike from 30 yards out deflected over the Bulldogs shot stopper and made it 2-1 with about 37 minutes left in the game.
Conneaut controlled most of the second half, desperate to win the game, but couldn't find many more legitimate scoring opportunities as Meadville's defense did a good job of frustrating the Eagles.
As it goes in soccer, Conneaut had about 80 percent of the possession second half but were caught off guard on a counter; as a nice ball that found Cottrell McDonald, who got one on one with the keeper, led to a calm finish to put the game to bed at 3-1 with about 7 minutes left.
"Meadville is the best 2-13 team I've ever seen. They have players who can play in Cottrell, Sam, and Dane Cessna. They worked hard and deserved the win. We were tired but should have came with the same intensity that we did yesterday and unfortunately Meadville had a little more in the tank, and appeared to have more direction to their play," said Conneaut assistant Ryan Kozlowski.
Tyler Bone (assisted by Nick Stockton) picked up an insurance goal with a minute and a half left to make it 3-2.
Conneaut dropped to 9-6-2 and put their playoff chances in jeopardy, but would have a chance to rebound and get into double digits wins Saturday against Hickory.
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