A modern-day David and Goliath played out in real-time at Saturday’s All A Classic State Tournament in Louisville.
The Todd County Central Rebels took on the part of David, making its first-ever appearance in the quarterfinal round of the state tourney.
Louisville Collegiate played Goliath, winners of six All A state championships and a 28-1 career record entering the weekend.
Unlike the Bible story, Goliath got the upper hand Saturday and defeated the Rebels 10-0 in 69 minutes.
Eight Titans scored with Elijah Hawkins and Nick Hrshaw each finding the net twice. Harshaw also had three assists as Collegiate controlled possession for most of the contest.
The Titans worked each side of the field for the first 10 minutes until Brayden Williams scored off a rebound for the first goal of the game.
“They are just so precise and so fast. You couldn’t give them anything. I think we held for 15 minutes trying to stay in, but we let too many in,” said Todd Central coach Mike Smith. “Maybe we could have played better if we played them again. But it’s one of the best losses I’ve had. I’ll say that.”
Collegiate would score four goals in a seven-minute stretch to grab control. They held Todd Central without a shot for the first 27 minutes and outshot the Rebels 32-4 for the match.
Collegiate led 7-0 at halftime as they continued to work the ball through the Rebel defense.
Harper’s second goal with 11 minutes left ended the match via the mercy rule.
It was the sixth clean sheet of the season for Collegiate (11-1-1), who beat Somerset 6-1 in the semifinals and will play Murray for the championship Sunday.
Ric Garcia made 12 saves for Todd County Central, who saw a 10-match winning streak come to an end. One of those wins was the program’s first-ever over Owensboro Catholic to advance to the quarterfinal round for the first time. And Smith hoping Saturday’s experience is something that fuels them for next year.
“We’re not going to totally erase it (Saturday’s loss) because these guys are motivated. They’re taking steps and they didn’t make this game last year. They knew they were gonna do it this year and they did it. We’ve been here this year. They’re already thinking about coming back next year and maybe winning it. So we’re gonna keep that,” Smith said.
The Rebels (12-4) have two regular season games left before 13th District play begins and hopefully a return trip to the region tournament where Todd advanced to the second round.
“If we can just take some of that mentality that we saw, they just saw the top level of soccer and there’s a lot that we can do tomorrow. And if they can do that, we feel pretty confident about our district and they may be doing something in the region.”
Todd Central will play at Trigg County on Tuesday.
