Miller City’s Ethan Barlage controls the ball against Spencerville’s Brodie Vasquez during Tuesday’s match at Spencerville.
Richard Parrish | The Lima News
SPENCERVILLE — In a rematch of the last two sectional championships, Miller City and Spencerville met to open the boys soccer season Tuesday evening at Spencerville high school.
The Bearcats gained the advantage out of the gate before seeing their lead trickle away in the final 10 minutes of action as Miller City collected a pair of goals in a 2-1 victory.
Spencerville jumped in front 13 minutes in thanks to an assist by Isaiah Stewart to set up Zach Zerbe’s first goal of the season.
“We have seen Zach (Zerbe) grow more in two weeks more than ever,” Spencerville head coach Josh Van Gorder said. “His mindset is to work as hard as he can and to put himself into position to score. Isaiah (Stewart) has worked hard on his speed and passing and set Zach up well.”
Miller City dominated time of possession and continuously had Bearcat keeper Brennen Lehman under fire. The Wildcats fired 23 shots on goal, 10 in the first half .
Spencerville led 1-0 at halftime .
“Brennon (Lehman) is not only a fantastic player, but he is a fantastic person. He is the first one to show his teammates that he cares about them.” Van Gorder said. “He got a hand on both goals, just an unfortunate bounce. He is hurting the most that the game didn’t go our way, he wanted this for his teammates.”
Miller City continued to attack in the second half, with 7:45 to play Ethan Barlage was tripped inside the goal box to set up the penalty kick opportunity.
Lehman guessed correctly diving to his right to deflect the shot attempt, Barlage had too much heat on the ball, and it deflected into the back of the net to level the score.
“It was a big part of the game; we were down the whole game, but we continued to attack, and I got an opportunity.” Barlage said. “It gave us momentum and after that we wanted to attack.”
Moments later Miller City benefited from another bounce. Silas Niese found net after a shot hit the left cross bar, with 3:25 remaining Miller City led for good.
“That’s just Silas. He has a knack for being in the right place at the right time. That was CJ Lehman’s’ cross that set the play up, that is his cup of tea.” Kevin Deitering said.
“To come down from 1-0 with under eight minutes to play is just a good feeling.” Deitering said. “In years past that is something we haven’t been able to do, if we got behind, we struggled to come back. To come from behind like this is kind of a milestone for us.”
Both teams return to the pitch Thursday evening. Miller City will play host to Lincolnview, Spencerville welcomes Temple Christian
Game summary
Goals: Zach Zerbe (S), Ethan Barlage (MC), Silas Niese (MC)
Saves: Lane Pester (MC), Brennen Lehman (21)
Nate Stidham wrote this story for LimaScores.com.
