The Becker Bulldog boys soccer team took to the field Thursday afternoon against the  St. Cloud Cathedral Crusaders — a team with a reputation of having highly-skilled players.

 

Those skilled players escaped Becker’s home field advantage with a three-goal win at 4-1.

 

The last time these two teams met last season, Cathedral’s team was pretty much the same team then as they are now. However, Becker has 13 new faces on their squad compared to last year’s team and Cathedral’s experience prevailed.

 

The Bulldogs pressed early and matched Cathedral as each Crusader push was stifled by the Bulldog defense, led by Junior Matthew Davalos.  Cathedral’s tactic was to pressure the Becker ballhandler immediately and not give them any room to execute passes or shots. 

 

The Bulldogs stayed even for the first part of the match, but fell behind eventually after a handball was called in the box.  The penalty shot was good, putting Cathedral up 1-0.

 

Shortly after the penalty kick score, Becker went on the offensive and started to open up Cathedral’s defense.  A great progression through midfield by junior Captain Qadry Fakhreddine put Andrew Davalos near the 12-yard line with a chance. However, his shot was scooped up by the keeper and Becker remained scoreless.  

 

The ensuing drive by the Crusaders was mishandled in front of the goal, leaving Cathedral's Forward Erik Gadbois with an easy goal past Goalkeeper Hunter McCalla.  

 

Becker was now facing a 2-0 deficit and were seeing the majority of action in their own end of the pitch.

 

The Bulldogs shored up the defense and again went on the offensive.  With strong play from the right side, senior Captain Nick Vieau launched a high, arching shot that Cathedral’s keeper just missed getting his fingers on. The result was a goal and Becker shaved the lead to 2-1 — and that’s how the first half finished.

 

The second half started the same as the first ended, with the teams still trying to feel each other out.  However, an early handball call again put the Crusaders on the penalty kick line and they made Becker pay, taking the lead at 3-1.  

 

The rest of the game, the Bulldogs were on their heels as the much more experienced Crusaders pressed hard and finished the game with one more goal to win the match, 4-1.

 

Becker’s junior Goal keeper Hunter McCalla stopped 14 of 18 shots.  

 

“Hunter had a good showing tonight,” said Head Coach Alex Jurek.  “I feel very confident in his play.  He will keep us good in many close games.”

 

To start off the season playing one of the better teams in Cathedral is tough, but it also showed Jurek some things he and his team will have to work on for their next match.

 

“We had strong play from our seniors,’ said the head coach.  “We knew that we had to play a near perfect game against Cathedral. “They are the team to beat in the Granite Ridge year in and year out for a reason.”

 

Jurek would like to see more goals but he likes what he sees from his defense and goalie.

 

“Our defense is still finding itself,” he said.  “We have strong, talented and skilled players at ever spot, and I cannot make a bad substitution because of our depth.  Our weakness right now is our lack of experience.  This will be taken care of in time.”

 

Overall, the coach was happy where his team’s play is at, despite the three-goal loss.

 

“We had four mental breakdowns,  two that killed us,” he said.  “You cannot make mistakes against a team of their caliber.  They capitalized on each of those mistakes.

 

However, this was our first match of the season against our strongest opponent on the schedule.  The mistakes we made are easily fixed and the kids know what they did wrong and will take care of it.”

 

Becker faced Monticello  Friday (full report on match in next week’s Citizen), then travels to Melrose Tuesday for a Granite Ridge Conference match.