Something had to change, and change fast. And it did. Tecumseh regrouped and put together a run that produced a 7-1-1 league mark and another Kenton Trail championship.
“That was kind of a slap in the face for us,” said Jason Runner, in his 12th season as coach. “We had 16 seniors graduate the year before (the 6-8-3 season). It was a big gap to fill.
“Sure, it was frustrating,” he continued. “I had two years where I just polished a couple things with the team and said ‘Let‘s just play.’ Now I had to get back to the fundamentals with them.”
It wasn’t easy.
“We had to keep the morale up, and at the same time we had to do some training sessions and revamp some things,” Runner said. “We had to learn how to adjust, how to work on our first touches. Our first four or five games, we didn’t even have our lineups set. It was definitely a mental thing, to get the guys to believe in themselves.
“They’ve come around and stepped it up,” he added. “But we still have got a little bit more to go.”
Fresh off a 4-0 Division I tourney win over Piqua on Monday, the 10-6-1 Arrows have a full head of steam heading into Thursday’s second-round sectional match-up with Springboro.
CBC Kenton Trail Player of the Year Alex Arevalos will lead the way. A junior, he was second in the CBC with 17 goals and 4 assists, while senior Brandon Thomas was tied for fifth in the league with 11 goals and 7 assists. Sophomore Kenyon Runner (6 goals, 6 assists), junior Kevin Alvarado (5 goals, 7 assists) and junior Cole Connor (6 goals, 4 assists) also add some scoring punch.
Defensively, junior Nathan Edman is second in the league with 92 saves.
Thomas leads a small class of seniors that as freshmen were part of a team that tied for the Kenton Trail title in 2013 and won it outright as sophomores in 2014. In the process, they compiled a 21-0-1 league mark and were 29-5-1 overall. The Arrows are hoping to get back to that elite level.
“We’re trying to get it to where 10 wins in a season and a CBC title are the norm,” said Runner. “We have a big class of juniors, nine to maybe up to 12 will be seniors next year. So we’re still going to have a pretty good core of kids coming back.”
Girls improve, too: Tecumseh's girls soccer team is 10-4-3, and finished 6-2-1 in the league, good for second place. That's an improvement of last season's 7-5-4 mark.
After a 1-0 D-I tourney win over Northmont on Tuesday, they will play Wayne on Saturday in the second round of sectionals.
Defense has been the Arrows’ calling card. Abby Adams has anchored a defense that has surrendered just 11 goals in 17 games, with 10 shutouts and 89 saves. Jasmine Hassell leads the offense with 27 points (11 goals, 2 assists).
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