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Wildcats bounce back from first loss, blank Cadillac

News Photo by Jonny Zawacki Alpena’s Ivo Arvidsson-Ullberg (5) celebrates with teammate Kyle Barbeau (11) after Arvidsson-Ullberg netted the first goal of a Big North Conference soccer game against Cadillac on Thursday at Park Family Field at Wildcat Stadium. The Wildcats defeated the Vikings 3-0.

Alpena boys soccer head coach Tim Storch sent a message to his team before Thursday’s Big North Conference tilt against Cadillac. The message to his players was that his team faced what he believed was a must-win situation after the team suffered its first loss of the season on Tuesday.

The Wildcats (8-1-1) (2-1 BNC) responded and answered Storch’s call with a shutout victory over conference rival Cadillac, winning by a score of 3-0.

“I told the guys before the game and I really meant that this was a must-win game and our biggest game of the season. We were either going to stay with the top pack or move with the lower pack in the Big North Conference. This game was going to define our season and whether we were going to be a team to that can contend or a team that’s a spoiler and I really believed that,” Storch said. “We’re going to be no worse than second place after tonight and that’s good. The other night was a game that could have gone either way, but it was important and I’ve always believed as a coach that you learn the most about your team after they lose their first game, especially when you’ve gone on such a winning streak and in our case outscoring our opponents by such a wide margin. I thought that this could potentially be a trap game, but the guys responded well.”

Despite Cadillac’s attempt to be defensively oriented, the Wildcats managed to move the ball around and create scoring chances.

Alpena controlled the first half and cracked the scoring column six and a half minutes into the game as the Wildcats’ early pressure got to the Vikings and Ivo Arvidsson-Ullberg got behind Cadillac’s defense and scored an easy goal to give Alpena and early advantage.

The Wildcats controlled the ball and didn’t allow Cadillac to advance the ball downfield, let alone get many scoring chances as Alpena outshot the Vikings 8-2 on the night.

With 3:19 left in the first half, Arvidsson-Ullberg struck again as he corralled a loose ball and delivered a perfect shot with his left foot to the top left corner of the goal that left the Cadillac goalkeeper no chance to make a save and the Wildcats took a 2-0 lead into the break.

“I’m happy with the way we responded tonight. We’re getting better every game and we have a lot of guys getting quality minutes and we still have to develop better depth,” Storch said. “We tweaked a little bit tonight and I liked what I saw and we were a more cohesive unit and I thought that made us a better possession team that was able to attack and defend and not get spread out.”

The Wildcats continued their dominance in the second half and played another mistake-free half while keeping the pressure on their opponent.

Alpena added its third goal with 26:14 left in the contest after a scrum in front of the net led to the ball rolling to Craig Tagliareni, who scored a beauty of a goal as the ball rolled to him. With his back facing the net, Tagliareni kicked the ball up and over him and the ball deflected off the cross bar and into the net for a goal.

After 10 games into the season, Alpena is 8-1-1 overall and 2-1 and near the top of the BNC.

It’s uncharted territory for the Alpena boys soccer program and the remaining schedule for the Wildcats only gets tougher from here as they play two BNC games next week, hosting Traverse City West on Tuesday and hosting Traverse City Central on Thursday before playing in their home Huron Shores tournament on Saturday.

Storch is hopeful his team can continue to play good soccer and live up to its state ranking.

“We’re a good team, but can we be great? It’s a question I’ve asked myself a lot. We have quality players, we’re strong in goal, strong on defense, we have some good team speed, dynamic up front and we’re a good team, but to be a great team you have to be able to do this every night,” Storch said. “We’re running out of games on our schedule where we can beat teams 8-0, now we’re into the meat of the BNC and that’s why tonight was a big night. I wanted to see what we could do against a team that finished second in the league last year, a team that we tied twice last year. To come out and beat them by three and in comfortable fashion is encouraging. It was important for us to come out tonight and be able to flip the switch back on after we lost a game and good athletes are able to do that, they’re able to put the disappointment of losing behind them and focus on the task ahead and we did that tonight.”

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