Missed opportunities

MARION — Regan Frost set the ball 20 yards away from the goal.

He took a few steps back, scanned the defense and let rip a shot that next touched twine.

The Patriots increased their pressure on the Tigers.

Scoring chances kept coming.

The equalizer never did.

Frost’s free-kick goal with 15:42 to play Tuesday handed the Jay County High School boys soccer team a 1-0 loss to the Yorktown Tigers in the quarterfinal round of the Class 2A Sectional 24 tournament at Eastbrook.

“You’ve got to realize it’s a game of free kicks when you play this team,” said JCHS coach Brad Horn, whose team had its six-game winning streak end. “We got them in the regular season with one.

“I can’t put that on our defense, just a great shot.”

Yorktown (7-11), which ended the Patriots’ season for the fourth consecutive year and third straight in the opening round, advances to the semifinal at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday against Muncie Burris, which knocked off Delta later Tuesday night.

Horn’s mention of free kicks was a nod to the physicality of Tuesday’s game, which was nearly a mirror image of when the two teams met Sept. 22. In that matchup, Jay County had the edge in scoring opportunities before freshman Christian Marentes scored on a free kick with 15 seconds remaining to lift the Patriots to a 1-0 win.

Tuesday’s physical play directly led to Frost getting the free opportunity from just outside the 18-yard box. It followed a sequence of plays that included Patriot senior Daniel Fugiett being driven to the turf with no whistle from the official.

Moments later, Frost was taken to the turf and got a whistle.

He put the ball on the 10-yard line — the surface doubles as a football field — just inside the number marker to the right. After gauging the defense, he fired a shot that was never more than four feet off the ground into the left side of the net past JCHS goalkeeper Cameron Henry.

“He came in, he played incredible,” Horn said of Henry, who stepped into the role after freshman starter Ian Ruiz got injured. Henry allowed just two goals in the Patriots’ six-game winning streak.

“That’s not really his ball to get,” Horn added. “We were supposed to have the backside post. (Frost) kicked it so hard we couldn’t react.”

Jay County (8-7), which had the advantage in scoring opportunities up until Frost’s goal, continued its dominance on offense. The Tiger defense just stood tall.

The Patriots were awarded four free kicks in the final six minutes, none of which tied the game. Their best chance came on a Marentes kick from about 25-yards away. He chipped a ball toward the goal that Yorktown keeper Hudson Bouw punched away, but not out. Jay County’s trio of Gio Perod, Ian McCombs and Derrian Riojas weren’t able to get a clean secondary shot as Yorktown ended the threat.

“You might think it’s easy to capitalize there but literally when they had 11 people in the box, in the goal, and we’re trying to shoot it on them the ball is going to bounce,” Horn said. “Unfortunately we didn’t have any lucky bounces this game.”

Still, Horn and the Patriots were left wondering what could have been.

What if Jay County got to play someone other than Yorktown in the opening game of sectional for the first time since 2015?

What if the official blew his whistle when Fugiett was put to the turf?

What if the Patriots got one more chance on offense?

“By far we had more opportunities, more chances than them,” Horn said. “In the end if you don’t capitalize it doesn’t mean anything.

“If they have one chance the whole entire game and they capitalize on it and we can’t finish on our multiple, in the end it doesn’t really matter.”