Marksmen 2, Stone Jug 1

Brian Rademaker mentioned at the start of this campaign that the irony of the marksmen playing stone jug on fathers day was phenomenal. As some know, myself and a few of my friends were invited to play with Jug last summer thanks to Rick Sweeney, and it was like opening Pandora's box to the BDSL. So my friends and I this year made the marksmen.

Sweltering day even on the lake in Youngstown. Jug in their neon shirts had about 16, Marksmen debuted our white alternate kits and had a nice bench of 18-19.

First half: scoreless. Nothing truly memorable about it. But I must acknowledge that even though a lot of us left Jug this year, they are great at recruiting because they replaced us with solid younger players as well.

Second half: Give or take 65 minutes in Dante Aversa was moved into a midfielders role and we gave Colin O'keefe the freedom to venture forward to search for a goal. Dante plays in our left back Ryan Miller who takes a somewhat poor shot down low that the Jug keeper couldn't keep out. Some would call it a howler, but as a goalkeeper I know what it is like AND the fact that with our pristine pitch there was a 99.99% chance the ball took an odd hop in front of him. End of the third quarter (water break). Jug started to pressure our net a bit more, with Antonnuci and others coming close but missing the frame. One play saw me come out to collect a ball, which then the ball was kicked out of my hands by notorious Rick Sweeney, who then somehow missed with an open net 10 yards in. I think to myself I can finally get my clean sheet. a few minutes later I believe it was off of a corner, andy wright linked with colin okeefe and colin makes a beeline to the net and took a few tries until he could finally poke the ball home. As the game dwindled Tyler Jones was holding up the ball in our 18 at a tough angle and with multiple defenders around him somehow gets a shot off that loops over me and goes far post. 2-1 is the final.

My teammates called it once we scored the second goal: I was bound to concede. Our defense is stout but will always let one slip by with me in net. That is how it ends, 2-1 good guys. We were happy with the results but came away from the game wishing we converted more of our chances. A potential few signings and tweaks to the starting XI could be what we need. Nice to see all the guys on stone jug again. Next game is against Great White Buffalo on the road.

Tyler's goal for the jug was an absolute peach of a goal. One of the best we'll see all year. I had a nice view of it as I was loafing around the 18 watching the action. Tyler was inside the box taking the ball away from the goal with two Marksmen defenders trying to track him. He did a shoulder shimmy and worked a half yard of space for himself and hit a high looping chip back through a packed box from a tight-ish angle that kissed the far post and went in. It was very nice.

When Ben says 'Dante plays in our left back Ryan Miller', he means Dante failed to control a pass into the box, it bounces off his knee to Miller, who then hits a fairly tame shot that somehow dribbled under Scott Buckley, one that will very much be in the 'I wish I could have that one back' category.

However the score was telling and fairly accurate to how the game progressed. Not many teams made up with better guys than the Jug. Hopefully we'll see them later in the season. I know there is a third Wright brother out there who is considering making a surprise appearance for the Jug later in the season. Best of luck to those guys.