By the time next Wednesday rolls around, the Skyhawks will have played an unusually large amount of soccer in a short period of time.
The Fort Lewis College men’s soccer team will hit the pitch Sunday for attempt No. 2 at its Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference opener against Colorado Christian. Wednesday’s game against Adams State was stopped by lightning just more than 62 minutes in and will be replayed from the start at 3 p.m. Tuesday, meaning that by the time it ends, FLC will have played almost four games in a little more than a week when only three were scheduled.
Keeping the legs strong, then, becomes even more important.
“I think that’s something that we’ve been looking at because if you look at the performance against Mary versus the Texas A&M (International) game, I thought we looked a lot fresher in the Texas A&M game, and I think it helped our performance,” FLC head coach Oige Kennedy said.
Getting healthy would be handy, as well. Yannis Becker sat out Monday and Wednesday with an undisclosed injury, and Kennedy said the training staff is in the process of figuring out just how serious the injury to last year’s leading scorer is.
Additionally, captain and junior center back Johannes Sander left Wednesday’s game with an apparent leg injury. Kennedy placed his status as day-to-day.
“The trainers are working hard with him to get him back fit and healthy again, and he’ll probably be a game-time decision,” Kennedy said.
Fortunately for the 22nd-ranked Skyhawks, they’ve had several players hop in to fill gaps for those injuries and an early-season malady that plagued Artur Piperkov, who returned last week. Austin Derksen and Aaron Kloer have played admirably on defense after spending most of their time earlier in their careers further up the field, while players such as Brook Assefa and Brandon Dooley have contributed in the central midfield in place of Becker.
“I think at the start of the year, Austin Derksen was somebody we were still trying to figure out where his best position was. ... Aaron Kloer has done really well to become an established player back there on the back line, and obviously with the latest injury in the central midfield, Brandon Dooley stepped up and did really well.
“It’s impressive how hard guys are working throughout the squad to make the squad as strong as it can be.”
rowens@durangoherald.com
