At the time that UHA’s Graham Conrad scored just 18 minutes into the match Saturday, you really didn’t give much thought to it possibly being the only goal of a steamy Saturday afternoon on the Daviess County pitch at Deer Park. Turned out it was the only goal of the day, and it gave the Blazers one of the biggest recent regular season wins for the program.
Conrad’s goal came at the 18:00 mark and the Blazer defense withstood the oppressive heat and the pressure of the Panther offense for all 80 minutes of the match as University Heights took down Daviess County 1-0 on the Panthers’ Senior Day.
Conrad drilled a shot from the front of the box from the left side that found its way to the back of the net, setting an early tone, and sending the message that the Blazers were there for the day.
While the UHA offense had a handful of opportunities the rest of the match, this quickly became about the Blazer offense which, despite the heat, found the way to persevere and keep slamming the door on the Panther attack, even though it felt like about 90 percent of the match was played with the Blazers’s backs against the goal.
And even when the Panthers were able to get shots on goal, Hayden Fitzsimmons was a wall in front of the goal not letting the perennial 3rd Region contender score a single goal for the afternoon.
Even as the Panthers cranked up the pressure over the final minutes, desperately looking for the tying goal, the Blazers defense did not break and went on to secure a huge regular season win.
In the last three meetings between the programs over the past 25 years UHA had tied the Panthers once and lost on two other occasions.
UHA improves to 5-1-1 on the season and is now off until a trip to Mayfield on September 8.
