Jay drops opener to Heritage

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They have 14 underclassmen on a roster of 27, and only three are seniors.

On the other side of the field, the older players are the lifeblood of the visitors.

Heritage had a four-goal night from a junior, two goals each from a pair of seniors and three assists from a third senior in beating the Jay County High School boys soccer team 8-2 Thursday in the Allen County Athletic Conference opener for both teams.

“It all comes down to, we’re still a somewhat young team,” said JCHS coach Brad Horn, whose team fell to 0-2 (0-1 ACAC). “At the same time we still just don’t know our placements. We don’t know what to do.”

Being out of place was evident in the seventh minute as Heritage (1-1, 1-0 ACAC) struck first. From deep in the Jay County zone from the left sideline, Connor Simmons threw the ball in toward the goal. It bounced once, and Bobby Lomow lightly tapped it with his head to keep it bouncing and over freshman JCHS goalkeeper Griffin Mann.

It was the first of three assists for Simmons, a senior, and the first of Lomow’s two tallies.

“He looks to pass first and it pays off,” HHS coach Joel Bunnell said of Simmons. “It shows up on the score sheet. We’re a team where we want to trust all 10 players on the field to move the ball, pass the ball, and he does a great job of that.”

After Angel Perez put Jay County on the board — it was the first goal of the season for the host Patriots after being shut out, 3-0, against Muncie Central on Tuesday — the quickness and passing ability of Heritage made the tie game short lived.

Ma Mae Soot sent a through ball to Zar Kyi Kan, who outran the defense, got himself in a one-on-one situation with Mann and went right side for the goal.

Kan completed his hat trick with two more first-half goals, and added another in the second half.

“Zar, great player, great discipline,” Bunnell said. “Works on his individual skills, his touches, and can find the corners very well when he has the opportunities.

“We like him to move the ball, but when he knows he can take guys (one-on-one), we have full confidence in him to do so.”

Following Kan’s first goal — it was 73 seconds after Perez tied the game 8 minutes, 29 seconds in — Lomow scored from the right side on a sharp-angled shot that went through Mann’s legs. It put Heritage out front 3-1 ahead of Kan’s second goal just before the midway point of the first half.

His most impressive score, however, came with 10:20 remaining before intermission. The junior found himself at the top of the penalty area with a trio of Jay County defenders blanketing him and managed to dribble between all three of them before firing a right-footer which found an opening to Mann’s left side.

Jay County’s only other goal came late in the first half as junior forward Daniel Fugiett scored on a loose ball in the box. Heritage goalkeeper Adam Koenig, a junior, attempted a clearing kick but missed, and Fugiett was there to clean up for his first goal of the season.

“For us scoring, it is going to be a lot of trash balls,” Horn said.

Fugiett, who missed Tuesday’s game because of a red card he received during Jay County’s 2016 sectional loss, and his other forwards didn’t get many opportunities. The JCHS midfield had difficulty getting the ball up the field to the forwards.

“Right now we don’t have anyone that can outrun their defenses,” Horn said. “We don’t have anyone that can make moves around other defenses.

“We have to go crash the trash balls. You saw there a couple times we did have decent through balls but no one was there.”