Lions fall to West Union by 1 goal

LEESBURG — Wednesday (Oct. 1) both the Fairfield Lions and West Union Dragons battled for a chance at a Southern Hills Athletic Conference win, but ultimately at Fairfield High School, the Lions lost to the visiting Dragons by a 2-1 score. 

The Lions trailed 1-0 at halftime as West Union’s Tyler Pennington scored a goal with 26:15 left in the opening half with an assist from Logan Caldwell. 

The Dragons took a 2-0 advantage when Caldwell scored a goal of his own, assisted by Owen Yeager with 18:39 left in the match. 

At the 12:44 mark of the second half, Quentin McIntosh scored a goal for the Lions, with the assist by Logan Burgess, cutting West Union’s lead in half at 2-1.

“We had a couple chances, but it really took us until after (West Union’s) second goal to wake up a little bit. We got ours off the corner, and we should have an another goal earlier off another corner, but it bounced and nobody really went after it,” FHS head coach Jacob Alexander said. “We are young, and we are making progress — not as quickly as we all would like — but at a certain point you aren’t going to be young anymore and you have to start making those plays.

“We have to start coming out with intensity. We came out flat in the first half and (West Union) dictated a lot of the play in the first half. We have to learn the motivation side of things of whatever it is going to take you to get motivated,” Alexander said. 

At goal for WUHS was Bryce Mills, finishing with 14 saves. Fairfield’s keeper was Anderson Humphreys who totaled four saves. 

“We have a good group back on defense, and they are working through the process of it,” Alexander said. “We have Joel Matthews, Mason Lightle, Noah Eldridge, and we sub in Liam Bender on the backline. They all do a good job there. We just have to keep working.” 

Following the game, the Lions’ record moved to 1-10-1 overall and 1-5-0 in the SHAC. West Union improved to 6-5-1 overall and 2-5-0 in the SHAC. 

BOX SCORE
WUHS    1 1 — 2
FHS        0 1 — 1