The Steamboat Springs High School boys’ soccer team can only control so much, and against Palisade on Saturday it controlled everything it could.
“The focus is what’s in our control, and how we played was 100 percent in our control,” SSHS soccer coach Rob Bohlmann said. “The consistency was there all game. We were able to get a lot of players some minutes, which is good.”
Against an outmanned Palisade team at Gardner Field in Steamboat Springs, the Sailors cruised to a 7-1 win, their sixth straight victory. SSHS defeated Palisade 6-1 in their first meeting Sept. 11.
The Bulldogs, now 1-10, were no match for the red-hot Sailors. Steamboat scored three goals in the first 16 minutes of play, starting with a goal by junior Cruz Archuleta in the 11th minute. Senior Jack Salyer scored in the 14th minute, and less than two minutes later, it was a second goal from Archuleta that made it 3-0.
Junior Ben Anderson scored his first career goal at the varsity level in the 27th minute to give SSHS a 4-0 lead at halftime.
Archuleta, the team’s leading scorer this season, entered Saturday’s contest on a bit of a scoring drought. That drought was forgotten when he scored this third and final goal of the game in the 51st minute to make it 5-0.
“Everybody goes through those peaks and valleys,” Bohlmann said. “Nine games in, and you have 13 goals. Goals don’t always come in every game. It was nice to see him get the hat trick today.”
The Sailors played a lot of reserves and junior varsity players in the second half, getting goals from Ross Stuart and Charlie Beurskens to extend the lead to 7-0. Palisade’s lone goal, by Matt Meyers, came in the 73rd minute.
Saturday’s game was the fourth straight at home for SSHS (8-1). The Sailors are back on the road Tuesday to face Summit County, a team it beat 2-1 Sept. 15 in Steamboat. SSHS is 3-0 on the road this season, a major source of pride for the Sailors.
“We had this vision that we wanted to be the strongest team in the league on the road,” Bohlmann said. “We talked about all those components it would take to achieve that. We are expecting a really good performance on Tuesday.”
Following Tuesday’s trip south, SSHS will host Glenwood Springs on Saturday.
Original Story by Austin Colbert at Steamboat Today.com
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