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The MCS Panthers Soccer team earned a hard fought 4-3 victory over Emge of Belleville Wednesday, September 23rd. The smaller Panthers took it to their opposition despite the obvious disparity in size. But that’s what MCS Panthers coach Bryan Weaver wanted. Coach Weaver said, “We didn’t play our eighth graders today because they have a game tonight at Columbia. So we just played our sixth and seventh graders today to give them a greater opportunity to play. That was a challenge for them to play against older and larger kids.” But the young Panthers rose to the challenge and defeated Emge on a late second half goal with only a few minutes remaining.
After the win I spoke to Coach Weaver about his team’s performance. Coach Weaver said, “They did fine today. It’s always a work in progress. You want to keep getting better. It’s not about any one person. We try to move the ball across the field side to side so we have a lot of touches. I teach the kids that it’s always faster to pass the ball than to dribble the ball.” And it was that philosophy that kept the Panthers in the game against the stronger, faster Emge team. Good centering and cross field passes resulted in three of the teams four goals. The Panthers controlled the tempo for most of the game keeping the ball on Emge’s end of the field. “The key at this level is teaching kids how to play soccer. It’s not always about winning. There have been times when we’ve won games but I wasn’t happy because we didn’t play well. At the same time it’s hard to lose. But hopefully we do a good job of getting the kids some valuable experience, they get some good exercise and learn to work together as a team. Hopefully in the process we’ll develop some kids for the High School level.”
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