The Franklin County High School boys soccer team lost to the Alcoa Tornadoes 4-3 at home Saturday in a qualifying game for the Class AA state tournament.
The teams alternated scoring throughout the contest with the Tornadoes taking the lead for good with 4:11 remaining to end Franklin County’s season.
Franklin County head soccer coach Kent Bean said that his team made some mistakes that the Tornadoes were able to take advantage of in a hard-fought game.
“I thought we played pretty well, but just had a couple errors, and (Alcoa) capitalized,” he said before reflecting on his team’s campaign as a whole. “It’s been a good season. We fought and stayed in some games that could have gone either way. This is a team that gives it their all. It’s just unfortunate to be on the wrong side of this one tonight.”
The first goal of the day came about five minutes into the contest with the Tornadoes scoring off of a corner kick to make it a 1-0 game early.
With about nine minutes remaining in the first half, a free kick from Kevin Hernandez bounced off the chest of Alcoa’s goalkeeper and rolled free, but the goalkeeper recovered and dove on the ball before a Franklin County player could get a foot on it.
Franklin County found an equalizer with 2:21 remaining in the first half as Hernandez received a downfield pass from Loui Arellano, broke through the defense and snuck a low shot past the opposing goalkeeper for a goal.
The score was tied at 1-1 at halftime.
The Tornadoes got off to a fast start in the second half and scored a go-ahead goal less than five minutes into the period to put Franklin County behind once again.
Franklin County answered back with 25 minutes remaining in the contest as a long pass from Isreal Mendez found the feet of Hernandez, and Hernandez fired a shot into the net to tie the score at 2-2 on his second goal of the day and his 34th of the season.
However, the game would remain tied for less than three minutes before the Tornadoes pushed the ball down the field and scored again to take a 3-2 lead with 22:52 left on the clock.
Franklin County was awarded a penalty kick with five minutes to go when Hernandez was taken down in the goal box, and Alex DeWolfe was successful on the ensuing attempt to tie the game once more at 3-3. It was the fifth goal of the year for DeWolfe.
The momentum flipped once again less than a minute later as a high shot from the Tornadoes found the back of the net to put Franklin County in a 4-3 hole.
Franklin County wasn’t able to produce another goal in the last four minutes as the team took a loss by one.
With the loss, Franklin County ended the season with a record of 9-6-3.
