RED LION — St. Elizabeth’s boys soccer team played Red Lion fairly evenly when the teams met on Sept. 15, but a 10-minute span midway through the first half made all the difference. The Lions scored three times in that span to defeat the Vikings, 3-1.
The Vikings had some chances in the opening minutes, with Spencer Trolio forcing the Lions’ goalkeeper to come up with a save in the second minute. The momentum evened out, but Red Lion’s keeper had to come up with two more saves before the Lions’ got going on offense.
The home team got on the board first in the 22nd minute. Harrison Pritt won a race to a through ball and rolled one to the lower left corner behind Vikings keeper Jack Collins for the 1-0 lead.
It only took four minutes for Red Lion to strike again. Dylan Denk scored the first of his two goals with a waist-high shot to the right side of the net. Denk added to the lead in the 30th, causing a St. Elizabeth turnover and burying a shot from about 20 yards out.
After a stretch where they couldn’t get anything going offensively, the Vikings struck. After a restart, Trolio drilled a shot high inside the right post past the goalkeeper to make it 3-1 in the 36th minute.
The teams traded corner kicks on a few occasions as the second half progressed, with the Vikings coming closest on a direct kick to the keeper on one of the corners. The closest either team came to scoring came in the 56th minute, when Troilo took a through ball, moved inside the 18-yard box and sent a blast off the crossbar.
No statistics were available late Wednesday night. St. Elizabeth fell to 0-3 and will visit Glasgow on Friday at 3:30 p.m. Red Lion (2-0) is right back in action Thursday when the Lions travel to Delmarva Christian for a 4 p.m. start.
All photos by Mike Lang.
