Warriors fall to Loggers

Sher Lee of Del Norte High goes after the ball during a home game against Eureka on Wednesday. For more photos, go to triplicate.com/photos The Daily Triplicate/Bryant Anderson

The Del Norte High Warriors boys soccer team dropped its home opener against the Eureka Loggers 3-0 on Wednesday.

Things were highly contested for the majority of the first half in the Humboldt-Del Norte Conference contest, with both teams getting a fair share of scoring chances.

Del Norte got a few solid shots at goal but could not get the ball in for a score. The Warriors had seven shots at goal for the game, with the majority of those shots coming in the first half of play.

There was a decent sized crowd who came out to watch the contest, with many Warriors fans along with a fair mixture of  those from Eureka cheering their teams on.

 Eureka was the team that was able to earn a goal first. It came late in the first half as they gained the upper hand over the home team. In the 29th minute the ball went off a Del Norte player and right to a member of the Loggers who kicked the ball in for the goal.

The Warriors did not seem the same after that as the scoring chances dropped and the Loggers scored two more goals in the 10th minute and around the 25th minute of the second half.

Del Norte head coach David Sanyaolu emphasized several times that his team must do a better job converting scoring chances if they want to succeed this year.

“I cannot overstate that,” he said.

He also felt that once the Loggers scored on his team it deflated them a bit.

“Once they scored on us our heads fell down,” he said.

Also, while there were some good moments, Sanyaolu said that the team must continue to do a better job of finding open teammates and being more precise with their passes.

But despite this, Sanyaolu liked the way the Warriors played for the most part, especially in the first half and said it was a solid outing. He said that he liked the aggression and fire he saw from many on the squad and that they did a lot of things right like getting down the field for scoring chances and making some nice stops on the defensive end.

“I think that overall we played a good game,” Sanyaolu said. “A coach is never happy to be defeated, but I think there’s promise here.”

Del Norte fell to 0-1-1 overall and in the HDN.

Last Wednesday the Warriors opened the year with a 2-2 tie at McKinleyville.

Del Norte next plays next Wednesday on the road against South Fork at 2:30 p.m.  Originally, the schedule had them playing at St. Bernard’s on Saturday, but the Eureka school recently decided it would not have a boys soccer team this year.