Sikeston's season ends following 3-0 loss to Farmington

sports@standard-democrat.com

FARMINGTON -- The last time the Sikeston Bulldogs took on Farmington on the road they watched an early two-goal lead slip away in a 4-2 regular season loss.

With their season on the line, the Bulldogs struggled to get anything going offensively as Farmington blanked the Bulldogs 3-0 in the opening round of the Class 3, District 1 tournament Thursday at Farmington High School.

"Farmington had the ball way more than we did the first 30 minutes and after that it was back and forth," Sikeston head coach Gabe Dement said. "I thought we had several chances at different times and their keeper made a great save on one of our free kicks. We had some good point-blank opportunities. It just felt like tonight the ball wasn't going to bounce our way."

As Dement alluded to, the Knights controlled the ball most of the first half with the Bulldogs dodging several bullets in the form of barely-wide shots and diving saves from keeper Max Ault.

The one they couldn't dodge came 12 minutes into the contest and left Sikeston playing from behind the rest of the night. Taking a long throw in from the right side, junior Matt Eaton settled the ball and had a Bulldogs defender 1 on 1 on the left side of the box.

Eaton got a clean shot and sent the ball into the far side of the net to give Farmington a 1-0 lead.

If facing an early deficit wasn't enough of a challenge for Sikeston, their leading goal scorer, sophomore Sam Cox, was far from 100 percent. He battled for much of the first half as the Bulldogs got more aggressive on offense, but in the end, couldn't overcome his injury.

"Went from one forward to two forwards up top, but one of those two forwards was hurting," Dement said of first half adjustments. "Our leading goal scorer Sam Cox was gimpy tonight. I tried to keep him in there as long as I could to see if he could dig deep, but he was hurting."

Sikeston's Dakota Ray (1), Audie Hay (3) and Conner Merideth react following the Bulldogs' 3-0 loss to Farmington Tuesday at Farmington High School. (Brent Shipman photo)

Sikeston's Dakota Ray (1), Audie Hay (3) and Conner Merideth react following the Bulldogs' 3-0 loss to Farmington Tuesday at Farmington High School. (Brent Shipman photo)

Farmington came out of the half with a decidedly more defensive approach, pushing extra defenders back while playing short on the offensive end. Despite this they doubled their offensive production with a pair of unanswered goals in the final 25 minutes.

Taking advantage of a Sikeston team that was forced to be aggressive, the Knights caught the Bulldogs in transition with 25:10 to play with Eaton netting his second goal of the contest.

"That second goal let us breathe a little bit," Farmington head coach Addae Rique said. "It was a nice pass from Andres' Castro at the top and Eaton cut across a defender and placed it in the net."

It was nine minutes later when Castro found the net himself and effectively put the game out of reach. Near the top of the box, Castro's shot came in low to the keeper's left side. Ault initially got his hands on the ball, but couldn't contain it as it slowly rolled in to make up the 3-0 final.

"I'd say 99 times out of 100 Max saves that," Dement said. "He kept us in the game with several good saves tonight, sprawling out and diving. The thing I was most proud of is we kept fighting for the ball. We kept fighting for chances no matter what the score was. My boys played hard. I'm going to miss those seniors."

The Bulldogs finish the season at 12-11-1 and fall in the semifinals for the second-straight year. They lose a group of seven seniors that include Audie Hay, Layton Jones Chase Gaines and Adam Johnson.

"We're losing our second and third point leaders," Dement said referring to Hay and Jones. "But we're getting back our leader and fourth place guy in Cox and Conner Meredith. That's something to build off of."