4/8/16

Tumwater 2, Centralia 1

(Tumwater, WA) When you begin the match with only 11 players all your fingers and toes are crossed that no one gets hurt. Well Centralia Coach Phil Strodemier didn’t have enough things to cross to avoid the curse as he lost not only 1 of his 11 players leaving them short-handed for the final 15 minutes but it was the player who had scored the Tigers lone goal.

Mario Silva went down in a heap deep on the Tumwater side of the field around the 65 minute mark and landed awkwardly apparently snapping both bones in his right wrist. The T-Birds would then buckle down defensively for the final 15-minutes and a 2-1 lead to pick up the hard earned win improving to 1-0 in league and 5-3 overall while the Tigers dropped to 0-1 and 4-3.

Now how did Tumwater come to that 2-1 lead? It began late in the 1st half after both keepers Jesse Vazquez for Centralia and Logan Hess for Tumwater had pitched shut-outs. Hess was pressed into duty because regular keeper Britton Fine was not available as he had been out of town for Spring Break and did not have any practices for this match.

Tumwater would get on the board in the 35th minute when Ryan Warren took a beautifully lofted free kick by Austin Mikesh and knocked it past Vazquez to put the T-Birds on the board first. This play also won our ProActive Physical Therapy Play of the Game. The 1-0 lead would hold up until halftime.

In the 2nd half the Tigers battled back and tied things up in the 44th minute when Luis Madrigal back heeled a pass to Mario Silva who pounded it home for the 1-1 tie.

The T-Birds would re-take the lead for good 6 minutes later in the 50th minute when the Tigers were called for a hand ball in the box giving Tumwater a penalty kick. Mikesh would take it and fire it to the right side of Vazquez and slipped it under Vazquez who had guessed right and dove to his right just missing the ball. The T-Birds would go up 2-1.

The Tigers were scrambling back to try and get a shot into the net and had been applying extra pressure on the T-Bird defense when Silva got injured. The Tigers then were down a man and trying to find a way to get in a tying shot but kept getting denied. The back line and defenders Caleb Whiteash, Adam Warren, Ryan Warren and Keegan Fields clamped down leading Tumwater to the win.

Our Tommy Lowe of the Greene Realty Group Player’s of the Game were Logan Hess for Tumwater and Roman Rosas-Gomez for Centralia.

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