D-C finds the right touch

Dundee-Crown's Malik Washington looks for a teammate during the second half Monday at Hampshire. D-C won, 2-1. (Travis Haughton - thaughton@nwherald.com) (Travis Haughton ())

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HAMPSHIRE – Dundee-Crown’s boys soccer team has had 12 months to figure out what went wrong last season.

Monday against Hampshire the Chargers looked as if they had solved whatever problems led to a four-win campaign last fall. The result, a 2-1 win against District 300 rival Hampshire, came from team work and an obvious camaraderie – elements that seemed to be missing last year.

From keeping the ball on the ground, completing neat and sharp passes and limiting the Whip-Purs’ offensive options, the Chargers played the kind of soccer they wanted to play and capitalized on the few mistakes Hampshire – a solid team in its own right – made.

“I think we played pretty well,” said junior forward Kyle Hagan, who scored the Chargers’ second goal. “We knew going in that this was going to be a tough match, and we knew we would need to play intense.”

The Whip-Purs (0-1) came out in the first half with the intensity D-C (1-0) was trying to establish, taking two quick shots that Chargers goalkeeper Scott Nowicke batted away.

In the first 10 minutes of the first half, Hampshire took four key shots before the Chargers gained their footing and got the ball across midfield.

D-C’s first five tries went over the crossbar and Hampshire keeper Marcus Quick knocked away two more before Chargers midfielder Mauricio Arellano was fouled in the box to set up a penalty kick.

Arellano converted with 28 seconds left to give D-C a 1-0 advantage at halftime.

“Giving up the penalty kick really didn’t break us,” Hampshire coach John Gosling said, “but giving up the goal so early in the second (half) did.”

Hagan got a pass from sophomore midfielder Malik Washington at the left post and sank a ball into the middle of the Whips’ net opening up a two-goal lead with 35:57 left to play.

“Malik gave me a great ball, played it in really nice from the side,” Hagan said. “The only thing I had to was find the back of the net.”

Hampshire got on the board 15 minutes later when senior forward Francisco Solis broke away from two defenders and slipped the ball past Nowicke for the eventual final mark.

The Chargers clamped down defensively, denying Hampshire another opportunity while taking four shots in the final 2 minutes as a last-ditch effort to put the game out of reach.

But Quick, who’d been busy in the net all night, turned all four shots away to finish the game with 11 saves in his season debut.

“Right at the beginning we had some nice passes but we weren’t getting the ball in the back of the net,” D-C coach Rey Vargas said. “Our passing tonight really was what got us right into it. That penalty kick helped, then after we got the second goal everything kind of flowed from there.”