WINSLOW — The Mount View soccer team enjoyed a nearly perfect season last fall, losing just one regular season game before being bounced out of the first round of the playoffs. Back for more this year virtually intact, the Mustangs can check one of those to-do boxes off their collective list.
Senior Darrett Fowler scored a pair of goals Wednesday, including one early in the second half to provide breathing room, and Mount View avenged their lone regular-season loss from a year ago with a 3-0 Kennebec Valley Athletic Conference Class B win over Winslow at Kennebec Savings Bank Field. Cassidy Pound also scored for the unbeaten Mustangs (4-0-0), who hadn’t toppled the Black Raiders in five years.
“This is definitely important,” said Mount View junior Elijah Allen, the engine in the heart of the Mustang midfield. “This was that cloud above our heads the entire year last year, that we just couldnt’ get past this game. This was definitely nice.”
The Mustangs are tired of being thought of us as nothing more than a good success story, a team that doesn’t need to be taken seriously.
“I think this team was overlooking us,” Fowler said. “I think a lot of teams are trying to see how we’re doing again this year and a lot of coaches are keeping an eye on us.”
The formula for success Tuesday was a simple one for Mount View. The Mustangs used their size advantage and their ball skills throughout the lineup to control the center of the park and turn it into possession. Anchored by a strong backline and midfield work rate, they found opportunity after opportunity on the ball.
Even though Fowler’s first was the only breakthrough of the first half, in the 37th minute, the Mustangs were far and away the better side from the outset.
“That’s what we’ve really worked on this year is owning that midfield and keeping a solid defensive line,” Mount View coach Dale Hustus said. “It’s hard for somebody to beat you when three-quarters of the game is going to be played in front of their goal.”
It had to be an eerie feeling for Aaron Wolfe, the Winslow coach who had used a similar formula to run his charges to the Class B North championship last fall.
Mount View’s ability to influence the game through sheer will was exactly what the Black Raiders (2-2-0) had done for years.
“Their experience shows. They know what they’re doing,” Wolfe said. “Experience is a huge piece in high school sports. You can add the skill in, but if you have the experience it helps you to play as a group. That’s a great equalizer.”
Fowler finished off his brace in the 54th minute, curling a bender under the crossbar after shielding off a Winslow defender to the right side of the 18-yard box.
Pound, in the 80th minute, added the insurance when Andrew Savoy sent him clear down the right wing.
“We wanted to keep getting to the 50-50s and keep our heads into the game to get to every single ball,” Fowler said. “We want to push, keep attacking.”
It was more than enough to see the win through against Winslow. For the first time in four games this season, Black Raider senior striker Isaac Lambrecht was held without a goal, though it was through no fault of his own as he was often left alone on an island trying to create chances out of one-on-three attacks.
In the first half, it took Winslow 31 minutes to put a shot attempt on target, and the only other look at goal the Raiders got in the opening 40 minutes came via Isaac Burbank’s free kick from 25 yards just before the break.
“Our whole goal is to pack the front so when we’re attacking we can keep it out of our defensive end,” Allen said. “The defense does a good job getting the ball out to the wings, and we do a good job of keeping it in the opposite third.”
“They probably pressured us a lot more (than other teams),” Wolfe said. “I didn’t think we came out in the first half ready to play. We were definitely back on our heels a lot. It was only (1-0), but it could have been more. I thought they deserved it and we weren’t ready to play. We’re moving people around, and we just couldn’t find the right combination of players.”
Travis Barrett — 621-5621
tbarrett@centralmaine.com
Twitter: @TBarrettGWC
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