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By Riley Bean
Ozark, MO – Last Thursday, the Ozark Tigers’ boys’ soccer team claimed their first district title in fifteen years. And now on Tuesday, the team won their first Class 4 sectional game in program history, earning a trip to the uncharted waters of the quarterfinals.
“For me, it’s really more about my senior boys who have just bought in and done everything I’ve asked them to do,” said Ozark coach Tom Davidson. “I just feel so good for them that they’ve found a way to get to this point. And for our program, it means the world. For us to be in the quarterfinal, we’ve never been here… To beat a great team like Kickapoo who has all the tradition and everything, it’s kind of a dream come true for us.”
The Tigers achieved the win on Tuesday by coming out aggressive at home against the favorite Kickapoo Chiefs.
Sophomore forward Lawson Spence got Ozark on the board less than four minutes into the game. Spence scored on a rebound off a corner kick to put Ozark up 1-0 right away.
Then at the 12:40 mark in the first half, senior midfielder James Pottberg put up a shot from outside the box and buried it to give the Tigers a 2-0 lead.
“It felt great,” said Pottberg. “It was a hard shot. I just got a feel for the ball and got my head up and let it go and saw it going into the back of the net. It was an amazing feeling. This team, we deserve this win today. It felt good.”
Ozark maintained the 2-0 advantage at halftime, but Kickapoo was motivated to change that.
As soon as the ball was kicked off to start the second half, the Chiefs made a point to match Ozark’s early aggressiveness. Kickapoo controlled possession and bombarded the Ozark goalkeeper to start the second half. That effort culminated with a goal from Josh Scheiderer with 21:25 remaining in the game, cutting the lead to 2-1.
“It was a tale of two halves,” Davidson said. “I thought we had the better of the play in the first half, and then obviously they did in the second half. You’re not going to put a team like Kickapoo away easily, and we talked about that at halftime that they would come at us with everything they had.”
“I think they might have been on their heels a little bit at the beginning of the game,” Pottberg said. “It might be a home field advantage, I don’t know what it is, but we just got right after them. And then we knew they were going to come out firing after halftime and that’s the kind of team they are. They’re a good attacking team, but I think just the confidence of going right at them from the beginning, I think that really helped us in the end.”
Despite the valiant Kickapoo effort, Ozark was able to hold them to just one goal, earning the win and the opportunity to keep playing soccer.
“Our defense played great, Sean Smith was huge tonight in the goal, and I’m just happy to play Saturday,” said Davidson. “There are a lot of ways to win soccer games. We found a way tonight.”
Ozark (18-5-1) will travel to Columbia to play Rock Bridge (17-6-2) on Saturday, Nov. 5 in the Class 4 state quarterfinals for a chance to go to the Final Four.
“It means everything,” Pottberg said. “Being fifteen years since we’ve won a district title, and a sectional win after it, it feels amazing. We just wanna keep going and we’ve got confidence right now and we’re excited for it. We’re ready.”
