Coming off a tough conference loss at Nixa, Republic responded out of the gate against West Plains Thursday night. The Tigers scored twice in the first 15 minutes and went on to a 3-0 win.
“After the game, we broke the game down into ten minute increments. Unanimously (the players) all said the first ten minutes of the game were our best,” says coach Mike Hines. “We came out and possessed the ball and spread the field.”
The Tigers scored first when Julio Quezada fed Payton Roetto for a goal. Quezada followed that up with a goal a short time later, with an assist from Dawson Sjomeling.
In the 2nd half, Mitchell Heinzler fed Quezada for a second goal to make the score 3-0, and Republic hung on for the shutout.
Hines says he was especially pleased with Republic’s play because they were in a new formation, because of the absence of emotional leader Cooper Kelly, who’s out with an injury.
“We played a completely different formation tonight,” says Hines. “We’ve always played a 4-4-2, and tonight we went to 3-5-2, so we had to incorporate two holding mids, or defensive-oriented midfielders. That’s always risky because if your mids go forward too far, that creates a gap between them and the defenders. You can be susceptible to counter-attack.
“Our backs got careless with the ball and we almost gave up a couple of goals, but that’s to be expected anytime we play a new formation.”
Republic returns to action in a COC match against Branson next Tuesday.
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