The Hunting Hills Lightning senior boys went toe-to-toe with a heavyweight in the Central Alberta High School Soccer League Tuesday and managed a 4-4 tie.
Hunting Hills battled to the draw at the Collicutt Fields against the Central Alberta Christian High School Knights, the top squad in the league the previous two seasons.
The Knights were undefeated in the last two years and won consecutive league titles, but have a loss and tie already on the docket in 2018.
The tie Tuesday for CACHS was a case of missed opportunity according to head coach Travis Eggink.
“I think we carried the play largely,” Eggink said.
“We had a few really, really bad defensive miscues and some lapses where we let them take it to us. They capitalized very quickly. I think we out-chanced them. We didn’t finish very well.”
Hunting Hills opened the scoring and looked good early, but the Knights roared back and scored three goals and held the lead at half.
Down 4-2 early in the second half, the Lightning dug deep and scored two within minutes to tie the game at four.
Lightning coach Dylan Winnicky was proud of the way his team fought to tie one of the premier teams in the CAHSSL.
“We got off to a good start, but the momentum completely swung and they had the lead at halftime,” he said.
“We just had a chat, had to show a little hunting heart. It was nice to see the boys come back and pull out a tie.”
Matt Baong netted a hat trick for the Knights and Nathan Baong added the other. For the Lightning, Tayson Miure scored twice, while Ethan Rousseau and Imran Momenzada added the others.
Winnicky added that the goal from day one was A-side of the league tournament and after the draw Tuesday he believes that’s possible.
“We want to make the A-side, just to have a chance because, in this high school league, it could be anybody’s game,” said Winnicky.
Add in a team that is largely made up of grade 10s and the Lighting have a bright future in the eyes of their coach.
“Just hopefully going forward with them it’s going to be promising for the next few years,” he said.
For Eggink, there’s lots of work to do with an inexperienced team if they hope to be back in the final of the league tournament next month.
“Expectations we have for ourselves is to be the top three or four in this league. We have to fight for that a little bit now,” he said.
“Last few years we looked after things, but this year we have a few things to look after. Bit of a different team this year, but still have to push them. Good to have some challenges, too.”
Email sports tips to Byron Hackett
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