Indians finish Panthers in sudden death

OSCEOLA — After their tournament championship last week, Creston boys soccer coach Chad Malmanger said he wanted his team to fight until the end of every game.

Though their season is now over after a 4-3 postseason loss, the Panthers (4-12) put that mantra into action Monday against the Clarke Indians (6-6) as they scored two goals in the final two minutes to send the game to sudden death overtime.

“It was a fun one,” Malmanger said. “The stat book doesn’t show how well they played tonight.”

The Indians came in hot, taking several shots at the goal in the first five minutes in the matchup, but sophomore goalie Josh Schaefer protected the net.

Ten minutes in, Clarke slipped by Shaefer with a goal from Oscar Castro who has 30 goals this season for the Indians.

The Panthers responded with juniors McCoy Haines, Dillon Starlin and Brennan Hayes all taking shots in the next 10 minutes, but none made it to the back of the net.

Schaefer had multiple saves before Clarke junior Moises Castro-Ramirez, with 13 goals this season, got the goal with three minutes left in the half.

Creston was down 2-0 at the half, but a similar play as their winning score in the tournament sent a corner kick from Starlin to junior Xander Drake to find Creston’s first goal.

Down by only one, Creston junior Gavin Evans became a force to be reckoned with on defense, acting as a second goalie.

“He cleared some off the line to keep us in it,” Malmanger said. “That was pretty impressive.”

Defending two corner shots, Evans delayed a score by more than five minutes until Castro-Ramirez found his second goal of the night.

As the clock ticked down, the Panthers continued to play as hard as they could. The team’s two seniors — Nolan Pryor and Carson Smith, weren’t ready to be done.

With two minutes remaining in the game, Hayes was tripped as he made his way toward the goal. Pryor was given the shot at the penalty kick which he easily put past the defender. The clock continued to wind as Smith took a wild shot to the goal, landing the game-tying shot.

“There’s a lot of grit there,” Malmanger said. “We were down 3-1 with just over two minutes left, and somehow we find the back of the net.”

The game went into a 10-minute sudden death overtime where the first goal would take the playoff victory and advance to face Chariton.

It was Clarke’s Cristian Espinoza who had the game-winning goal to finish the Panthers and keep the Indians alive in the postseason.

“It’s not the record we wanted, but we learned a lot and grew as a team,” Malmanger said. “If I could write an ending that wasn’t storybook, storybook is winning it, this is as good as I could get.”

The Panthers were slow to leave the field as reality sunk in. Malmanger said he wishes he had the answer of what to tell the kids after such a heartbreaking loss.

“I want them to be well,” Malmanger said. “I want them to understand that I truly care about them, and that the score at the end of the game doesn’t make them a better neighbor in life. Hopefully they can use this score to grow in their athleticism and continue to be the great neighbors that they are.”

The Indians will play Chariton at 7 p.m. Monday. Location is to be determined.