Kennewick and Richland Face Off - by Landon Dunnum

  On Saturday, April 8th, the Richland Bombers boys soccer team faced off against the Kennewick Lions at Bomber field. The Starting XI for the Bombers consisted of Alex Chen at Goalkeeper, then Michael Webster, Dylan Peart, Matt Deforest, and Will Um filled out the back line. In the midfield was Justin O’neil, Lucas Wakeley, Owen Jackson, and Martin Rivera. To round up the squad was Kam Haff, and Justus Thurman. 

The start of the game did not go well for the Bombers, as Kennewick forward Layton Brooks scored 51 seconds into the game after a missed clearance by the Bombers defense. Once that first goal went in, you could tell that the Bombers where shocked at how fast they where breached. With 37:30 to go in the half, Dylan Peart tackled down Layton Brooks on a breakaway, and got the first yellow card of the match, lucky to not be sent off, as he was through on goal.  After the rought start, the Bombers settled down, and then started to get themselves back into the game by creating a couple of half chances. The first real chance came with 23:23 left in the Half, as Justus Thurman had a breakaway on goal and just pushed the slow roller left of the post to give the Bombers there best chance of the game. This gave the Bombers confidence to keep pushing to tie the game. 7 minutes later, Kam Haff drew a penalty kick after perfectly baiting a Kennewick defender to step into his stride and take him down. Senior Captain Lucas Wakeley stepped up to take the penalty, against the Kennewick keeper. Lucas stepped up to take the pen and it was saved by the keeper, but after the referee discussed with the assistant referee they decided that the Goalkeeper jumped off his line before the kick was taken, and had to be redone. Taking the penalty this time, stepped up Junior captain Owen Jackson. As Owen took the pen, he slotted the pen into the bottom corner, but again the Keeper jumped off his line to soon, and the Bombers where forced to take the pen a third time. For the third penalty, Lucas Wakeley was given a second chance to correct himself and to tie up the game. With 14:03 left in the Half Wakeley slotted the ball into the bottom corner to tie the game up. That is how the half came to an end, with the momentum with the Bombers. To start the second half, there where no changes to the lineup. The Bombers started the half off strong with constant pressure on the Kennewick Defense. 

With 37:30 to go in the game, Lucas Wakeley got booked through a yellow card, by tackling one of the Kennewick Lions to the ground. 7 minutes later, the Kennewick goalkeeper had a terrible mistake by whipping on a kick and the ball fell right to Justus Thurman who took his opportunity to chip the keeper and to take the lead in the game. After the second goal, the Bombers knew that they had to get a third to put the game to bed. Midway through the second half, Thurman had a run on goal, but was called offsides and he proceed to kick the ball way after the whistle and earned himself a yellow card. 2 minutes after this, the Bombers earned a corner kick with 23:07 to play, Freshman Attacking mid-fielder Martin Rivera took the corner, and laid a perfect ball to the back post where Freshman Will Um was waiting to pounce with his head to score his first goal for the Green and Gold. I spoke with Sophomore Evyn Mclellan who is a player for the Bombers and currently out with a broken collarbone. I asked him what he thought of Will Um’s performance. “Will had a heck of a game, and was fortunate enough to score in his first game with the Bombers. He had been working very hard in practice, and earned a spot to start that game, But most importantly, Mclellan said he was proud of his teammate who deserved to score and had been putting in the work”. Towards the end of the game, the Lions ramped up the pressure, and had the Bombers playing defense for the last 10 minutes of the game. Luckily for the Bombers, the Lions could not create any good chances and couldn't finish any of the half chances that they did create. With that the Bombers won a hard fought game and got revenge from opening day were they got shutout 3-0. After the game, Mclellan shared his thoughts with the teams overall performance “They played a hard fought game, and deserved to win, after going down so early in the game it was nice to see my teammates respond and not just put there heads down. He was really impressed with Kam Haff who drew the penalty kick, and was being shifty with his movement and dribbling.” The Bombers next game will be against Chiawana in Pasco.