CONCORD-NORTHWOOD IMAGES

LUIS AND CARLOS ENJOYING SOME ATTENTION

HOME DUG OUTS BETTER OUTFITTED THAN THE VISITOR ONES...

CONCORD-NORTHWOOD 1-1 (1-1)

FIRST HALF-The scoring starts and ends early today; Concord scores in the 10th minute (#17 Castillo) and three minutes later, Sebastian drifts into the Concord box and gets fouled, the referee decidedly points to the dot for a pk. Seba slots the penalty to his left and offers the Minuteman GK no chance to keep the ball out of the net. The game goes back and forth in a high tempo for most of the first half. In the 38th, Chan's pass goes to Concord and the counter ends near the box where a good shot gets saved by Graber. Kayden informs the coaches and the bench that he is faster than Concord's #9 but #9 waves that off. HALF TIME- Some issues are addressed, one of which is that the Concord keeper is not that good and that we need to get the ball to the forwards more and that we need to take shots. SECOND HALF- Obviously, scoring wise nothing happens in part two of the game.Graber makes a double save in the 42nd after a Minutemen free kick. Graber grabs another one when a cross comes in the box even though Chase gets in his way ("I'm backing him up" is his explanation even though he was in FRONT of Graber). The trick free kick almost goes in when a deflection assists in the ball going wide of the Concord goal.In the 55th a high ball in from Concord comes near the NW box. Chase goes up for a header but gets taken out by a Concord player. Chase hits the ground hard but after a while, gets back up. He is checked out by the AT and cleared to go back in. The Concord offender gets away with a yellow caution; he is a lucky guy (the replay we watched on Hudl shows that he either has no clue what he is doing or I am not sure what the other option is). In the 77th, Kayden NEwcomer is the first Panther recipient of a yellow card on the season. The game ends in 1-1. The Panthers are 0-1-1 on the young season with the same record in NLC. The JV game ends the way it began 0-0. NOTES - Monday's practice will be at the turf field. Next up: Lakeland at home on Tuesday at 5:30 pm (Lakeland has no JV).

SOCIALLY DISTANCED LINEUP BEFORE THE GAME AT CONCORD

NW-NR IMAGES #1

AND SOCIALLY DISTANCED ON THE SIDELINES

THE BENCH(ES)

NW-NR IMAGES #2

SOCIALLY DISTANCED CROWD IN THE STANDS

STUDENT SECTION OUTSIDE THE FENCE...GREAT TO SEE, NOW WE NEED TO GET THEM SOME HORNS, BELLS, WHISTLES AND FLAGS!!!!

NorthWood-Northridge 0-3 (0-1)

COACH DUERKSEN ON THE SIDELINES DURING THE SEASON'S HOME OPENER.Class 3A #10 vs Class 2A #10 starts late due to weather and kicks off after a shortened JV contest (1-1 with two OG's). It turns out to be the Chappell show. NR #5 Cam Chappell scores a hat trick using his speed and accurate shooting ability. His first threatening run at the NW goal comes a minute before half time as he speeds by Cam and Nick and chips the ball over Graber. He adds another one in the 57th and one in the 59th to make it 0-3. NorthWood does not threaten enough offensively and only makes the NR keeper make a couple of saves on the night. Overall, we do not play poorly, we are somewhat disconnected between the three lines and even disconnected offensively at times. The heart of our defense performs well; the communication between Chase and Nick is very good. Graber makes a couple of unbelievable cat like saves and we are able to use a lot of our substitutes who all do exaclty what is asked of them. All in all, not the start we wanted but there are a lot of positives we can take away from the game. Friday will be a short light field practice followed by a video session. Next up is the away game at Concord on Saturday. The bus leaves at 9 am and the JV game kicks off at 10, followed around 11:45 by the Varsity match.

Fourteenth year of Dutch Touch game reports

Tomorrow's game report from the Northridge at NorthWood matchup will signify the start of the 14th year of game reports on the Dutch Touch blog. Stay in touch with NW soccer throughout the season to stay up to date on the latest Panthers soccer news.

Match Day 1 - #10 (2A) NorthWood - #10 (3A)Northridge

The season kicks off with a matchup versus the senior heavy Raiders squad. Northridge comes off a decisive 0-8 win over Bethany Christian this past Tuesday. Players to watch on the Raiders' side are Chappell (#5), Wieland (#11) and Stoltzfus. Northridge is one of the favorites to win the NLC this season. The Panthers have not played an official match since October 7th of 2019. NorthWood comes off a a record setting 13-3-1 2019 season and will field an experienced Varsity but did lose veteran seniors Skyler Duerksen, Trent Edwards and Jerson Sanchez but still have returning lettermen Andre de Freitas, Sebastian Guillen, Chandler Bontrager, Cam Iwema, Andrew Graber, Nick Lechlitner, Kayden Newcomer, Marshall Beebe and Joey Eshelman taking the field tonight. Capacity for tonight's game is capped at 200 due to local Covid-19 restrictions. The JV will start at 5 pm. The JV will need to be at the field at 4:15 pm.The Varsity match will start following the JV contest at approximately 6:45 pm. Game temperature will be around 88 degrees. Expectations are high for the Panthers which will field one of its best teams ever and obviously face a very strong and experienced Northridge team. Alex Ascamilla is the only player not available tonight.

PUGG Championship, 2nd and 3rd place teams

2020 PUGG CHAMPS

Last week the PUGG championship was played after a two week delay. For the 5th out of the 6th time, the Coaches team (DDDDD United) came out the winner by beating the Gray Team with Ethan, Joey, Marshall, Trent and Ernesto. Third place went to the Red Team with Kayden, Soloman, Aiden (Schrock), Lukas and Graber.

Your 2020 NorthWood Boys Varsity Soccer Team

Boys Soccer tickets information

The Athletic Office will sell a maximum of 200 tickets for each home match. Tickets can be purchased online and all tickets include the JV contest. All online ticket sales shut down 24 hours prior to the start of the event.

Watch NW games -instructions below (click on image to enlarge)

Concord Ticket Information

Tickets for the game at Concord this Saturday (8/29/20) will be available Wednesday at the NorthWood Athletic office. Tickets are 5 dollars each (2 per family max).

2020 Season about to kick off

With just a few days left to prepare for the first match, the Panthers will spend the next few days on the turf. With the most difficult of starts, NW will take on Northridge on Thursday and will travel to Concord Saturday. The Panthers are ranked #9 in the pre-season poll, the highest ranking it has ever received but now it is getting close to the time to prove we are worthy of the expectations. So far the preparations for the 2020 season have been difficult at times due to the fact that we were not allowed to have full contact in the beginning, were then allowed after several weeks, to oractice with full contact only to have that rule change again. But for about a week now, we are back at normal practices and the focus has been on conditioning, getting back in the game rythm and tactics. Due to the Covid-19 restrictions in ELkhart County, we have had to cancel the NorthWood Invite last weekend and so, the season starts almost a week later than normal. Northridge will play its first game tonight at Bethany and will have a slight advantage by having a game under their belt when they take the pitch at NW Thursday. There will spectator restrictions at each venue. Coach Duerksen will send some of those out on Remind for away games and for home games, the information can be found on gonwpathers.com . Tickets for the first home game can be bought online at the gonwpanthers.com website. There is a "Buy Tickets" button you can click on next to the upcoming home game. If sold out, you can sit outside the fence and watch the game but behind the goals the windscreens might obstruct your view. If you watch the game while facing south (so if you are on the north side of the field), please remember to turn off your head lights. The home opener starts with a 5 pm JV start which is followed by the Varsity game around 6:45 pm.