Second-half rally lifts Wood River boys 3-2

Wood River had lost six consecutive games over three years to Twin Falls by a combined 23-4 score, and five of those losses were shutouts. Hailey hadn’t beaten the Bruins since the 14-2-1 Wolverine "Dream Team" of 1994.

Yet Saturday’s tenacious team effort erased the four-year losing skid and installed Wood River in the driver’s seat of the 1998 league race, with four league games still to play.

Combined with its 3-0 home triumph over Burley Wednesday, Wood River (4-0-1) improved to 2-0 in league play, good for six big points. The Wolverines after scoring 8 second-half goals in their last three games are working on a four-game winning streak.

Juniors James Cordes and Graham Watanabe, and sophomore Jason Southward scored against Twin Falls. In the Burley triumph, Josh Keefer broke a scoreless halftime tie with a penalty kick, then Southward and Thayne Rolf added insurance as goalkeeper Charlie Askew recorded his second shutout.

It was the Twin Falls comeback victory that pleased Wood River coaches Brian Daluiso and Craig Roth. "What a satisfying win," said Roth.

They knew that Wood River had outplayed Twin Falls in the last two meetings of the soccer teams—a 1-0 loss at Twin Falls and 5-4 setback at the state tournament last year—and had come up empty.

This time, Wood River found a way to win. However, it looked like a Twin Falls kind of day in the final 10 minutes of the first half when two Wolverine defensive breakdowns and two good, individual plays by Greg Kester and Erick Martinez put the Bruins ahead 2-0.

After a Twin Falls defender drew a red card for pushing Keefer to the ground early in the second half, the Bruins had to play a man short for the rest of the game.

But Twin Falls picked up the pace and controlled the ball for a while—until Wood River midfielder Trevor Brown dispatched a lead pass ahead to Cordes on the right wing.

Cordes fought off a Bruins defender, cut past him and drilled a tough-angled shot that rattled high into net at 14 minutes. "That changed the momentum of the game right there," said Roth.

Three minutes later, defender Alex McLaughlin sent a pass up ahead to Cordes, who found sophomore Mike Spaulding in the box. Spaulding’s shot was blocked, but Watanabe was there to punch home the equalizer and then do a front flip before the kickoff to celebrate his first goal of the season.

"A tenacious goal," said Roth about Watanabe’s finish.

Soph striker Southward started building the winning goal about 40 yards out.

He shuffled off a pass to Keefer and charged towards the net. Keefer looped a pass ahead to Cordes, who shoved through two defenders and left-footed a pass to Watanabe, and Watanable shot quickly in the box. Southward picked up the rebound, deked the defender with a couple of moves and gathered the ball on his left foot.

Southward shot back across the grain into the right corner and Wood River celebrated.

The Wolverines also benefited from a red card against Burley. Ten minutes into the second half of a 0-0 deadlock, a Bobcat defender got the gate for hauling down Spaulding on a breakaway. Keefer fired the ball into the right corner on the penalty, the eventual winner.

Wood River added insurance on perhaps the season’s prettiest goal. The bang-bang play started with a Cordes throw-in to Keefer, who led Watanabe with a pass on the right wing side. Watanabe made a great cross that Southward headed home at 28 minutes for a 2-0 lead. Then, junior Thayne Rolf rifled a shot into the right corner for the 3-0 final.

In both games, the defense led by McLaughlin, Justin Nelson and Jacob Risner was exemplary.