TROY, Ill. – The rivalry between Father McGivney Catholic High School and Triad High School is certainly blossoming, especially on the soccer field.
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“We talked about it before the game,” Triad head coach Jim Jackson said. “That school has just exploded. You can’t even get in there; they don’t have room for the kids that are going there. We talked about there might be a kid sitting in the stands tonight, and he’s on the fence of going to Triad or McGivney.”
The schools, separated by less than six miles, have had a one-sided rivalry. After Tuesday, the Knights have won six of their seven meetings all-time.
Triad hosted the Griffins Tuesday evening and came out on top by a score of 2-0, bouncing back from last season’s 1-0 defeat in Glen Carbon. Last year was the first and only time the Griffins have beaten Triad.
The Knights remain undefeated on the season with a 2-0-1 record, beating O’Fallon 3-1 and tying Collinsville 3-3 in week one. It was McGivney’s first loss of the campaign as it slips to 3-1.
Tuesday’s game was all Triad for the opening 15 minutes. The Knights nearly had an early lead in the fifth minute, but McGivney keeper Patrick Gierer made a quick diving save to his right to deny Brayden Kelly’s short-range shot. It was the first of many heroic saves for Gierer on the night.
But a well-orchestrated set-piece routine fooled the McGivney defense and left Gierer with not much of a chance to make a save in the 11th minute.
A free kick from about 25 yards out was played short to Aiden Novich, who took a touch and beamed a low cross into the box where Eli Noonan was waiting at the back post to tap it in.
It was a free-kick routine straight off the practice ground.
“We worked on that the other day,” Jackson said proudly. “It was a pretty nice piece. To score on a set piece, something we work on, that’s awesome.”
But for the next 20 minutes or so, McGivney seemed prime for a game-tying goal. The Griffins fired in corner kick after corner kick, but to no avail as they still trailed 1-0 at the half.
“We always talk about, when you score a goal, you have to pick up the tempo, and we went the whole different way,” Jackson said. “[McGivney] started getting some stuff, then we started getting nervous. They had multiple corners and throw-ins, and they were very dangerous.”
The Knights regrouped at halftime and scored quickly to double the lead in the 47th minute. Kelly sent a ball in deep toward Colby Wheat, who slotted his shot into the lower left corner to give his team the 2-0 lead.
It was the first time this season the Griffins had been shut out, outscoring their opposition 12-0 in the three opening Metro Cup games.
“We’ve got a young team,” newly appointed head coach Brett Schubert said postgame. “We’re going out with three seniors, four juniors, four sophomores; three of them being hurt. You’ve got to find some sort of spark off the bench, and we just didn’t have that tonight.”
“Kudos to Triad. That’s a good team,” Schubert continued. “They’re athletic, they’re deep. For us, it’s more of scratch this and move to the next one. Get healthy is the main thing.”
Schubert took over for Matt McVicar, who coached the team for the last five seasons with a final record of 56-39-7 with two regional titles. Last season was McGivney’s best in program history with a 19-5-2 record, but the team graduated eight seniors.
Among those seniors was leading goal scorer, Spencer Martin, who raked in 33 goals with 11 assists last year. Aaron Broadwater had eight goals, and he too graduated. Broadwater was captain alongside Spencer Sundberg, who played a key role in defense.
Triad also has many new faces all over the field after a large graduating class as well. So, both teams were still trying to figure out some things on Tuesday night.
Both teams jump back into action on Thursday, September 4. Triad travels to Granite City at 6:45 p.m., and Father McGivney hosts Waterloo at 4:30 p.m.
