Tiger Cubs turn in second win in two days against Indian Creek

The Greencastle Tiger Cub boys’ soccer team used a high-pressure offense to frustrate the Indian Creek Braves on Wednesday night. The Cubs overcame a slow start, scoring-wise, to defeat the Braves 4-0 in Western Indiana Conference play.

“We want to control the ball, set the tempo and frustrate other teams,” Greencastle head coach JD Sims said.

That philosophy was evident early on as the Cubs consistently had the ball in attack mode and had several chances to score in the first half. Greencastle, unofficially, had 12 shots on goal in the first half, while Indian Creek managed just two attempts to put the ball in the net. Unfortunately for the Cubs, they were only able to convert one time in the opening 40 minutes.

Jackson Rodgers was able to convert a ricochet shot of Micah Foss at the 10:36 mark of the first half. Despite the big advantage in shots, that would be the only score of the half. The teams would go to the break with Greencastle up 1-0.

“We try to move the ball around. I think we didn’t score (early) because we forced a lot of things. We pushed too hard,” Sims said.

Indian Creek got the first scoring attempt of the second half, but did not convert, and the Cubs would begin to take advantage of the situation. Dylan Barcus scored on a beautiful header with 36:24 left and just two minutes later Foss drilled a kick and the Cubs suddenly had a 3-0 lead.

“I gave them a good talking to at halftime. They really stepped up in the second half,” Sims said.

Greencastle did not waste much time again in getting another goal. Jalen Hardman got free and put one in the back of the net with 28:10 left and set the final score at 4-0.

“In the second half everyone got a little tired. It’s hotter than Hades, so we got some chances,” Sims said.

Greencastle spent the second half liberally substituting players, but still dominated play. Greencastle controlled the ball on their end of the field an estimated 75-80 percent of the time. When the ball was backed up, the Cubs were able to quickly convert and they used the big leg of goalie Harris Weltz to get out of trouble frequently.

“He (Weltz) does not get a lot of chances in goal when we play like this, but he has a huge leg and allows us to kick the ball back,” Sims said.