The Greeneville boys’ soccer team claimed its 15th-straight league championship on Friday night with a 7-0 win over Volunteer.
Each year brings new hardware to Greeneville’s impressive trophy room. For this season, the District 2-AA championship will remind coach Jerry Graham of the tough road leading up to it.
“We always talk about how each one has their own identity and this one’s special just because of the tough year we’ve had. We’ve struggled a little bit with some wins this year, but it’s a tough schedule. Some injuries, especially early on into the season, so to be able to come on strong and win a District Championship is pretty important,” Graham said.
Greeneville executed their pre-game plans to attack early and build a lead by halftime. Their regular season matchup was a completely different first half than what was displayed on Friday. The Greene Devils went into the locker room trailing 2-1 in March and made sure not to let that happen again.
“That’s one thing we tried to do because we came out so slow last time. I think we went down 2-1 at halftime against them. It’s one thing we’ve been talking about and harping on the last week with them is that we have to come out strong,” Graham mentioned.
They controlled the tempo, controlled the midfield and controlled the scoreboard for almost the entire eighty minutes.
Samuel Gourley and Aiden Inscore were both of Greeneville’s multi-goal scorers on Friday. Both claimed two goals each in the win. Simon Holt, Christian Banegas, and Griffin Gricunas were the other three goal scorers.
Banegas was the first one to strike the back of the net in the 11th minute. With Gorley’s goal in the 19th minute business started to pick up. Only two minutes after Gourley scored, Gricunas struck one to the back of the net in the 21st.
Four minutes later Gourley scored a goal that wasn’t originally ruled a goal, but was later overturned after a discussion amongst the trio of officials.
Inscore scored his first of two in the 37th minute to send Greeneville into the half leading 5-0.
Simon Holt broke through and finally got one to go in the 53rd minute of action. Inscore scored his second and Greeneville’s last in the 65th minute.
Greeneville lifted their 15th-straight league crown after a dominant 7-0 win against Volunteer.
The win helps Greeneville host Tuesday night’s Region 1-AA Tournament opener at Burley Stadium. They are set to host David Crockett High School after the Pioneers’ 3-2 defeat to Tennessee High. Game time is set for 6 p.m.
“They’ve probably been the favorite to win District 1 all year and then, I guess, in some people’s minds it might have been an upset to get beat and come here. So, here we are playing what looked like it could be a championship match in the semifinals which is an elimination match,” Graham mentioned.
