The biggest rivalry in Chattanooga high school history is one way people would describe the matchup between McCallie and Baylor. It doesn’t matter if it is baseball, soccer or football, when these teams meet they always elevate the level of play and the atmosphere around them. That is exactly what happened last night when unbeaten and nationally-ranked McCallie beat Baylor 4-1 in their final game before the playoffs.
McCallie came to Baylor and faced them at their grounds. A lot was at stake, more than just one more win or loss on the record. McCallie needed to keep the first seed in the playoffs. This would give them about two weeks off for bye games. Having this time would give them an edge going into regionals and so on.
The game kicked off and McCallie used their new 4-4-2 diamond formation that has been giving them success all season. Baylor used their 4-3-3 formation with a defensive midfielder. McCallie held possession and was the source of the majority of attacking chances in the first half. It became obvious that the Blue Tornado would find the first goal. Instead, they found two in the half and left the Red Raiders behind as they built a solid lead.
The first and only two goals in the first half came from McCallie’s Brandon Mathurin. Mathurin had a great game on both sides of the ball. He built up several counter attacks that kept Baylor on their toes the whole game. Both of Mathurin’s goals were created by a throw in by Kenneth Chime who was able to launch the ball into the box every time. The plan was to put the ball into play and have someone in the middle to receive and distribute to the back post. This worked to perfection twice with Mathurin scoring twice.
The Big Red picked up play in the second half and found themselves on the attacking end of things more often then they did previously. It did eventually lead to a goal by Phillipe Laforge halfway through the second half, but it was not enoughas the Blues found a couple more goals to clinch the win. There was not much Baylor could do to change the outcome.
Dylan Capazario finally found his goal one on one with the keeper. Capazario blasts it and the keeper was able to get a hand on it, but it wasn’t enough to stop it from reaching its destination. Next to wrap of the scoring was a goal from Richard Todd. Todd found himself in and out of the game usually playing the attacking midfield position. He took his chance on a breakaway and was able to beat the last defender and the keeper to make his goal the easiest one of the night.
Chris Cushenberry, McCallie's long time coach, spoke about how the match went and how it influences the post season for McCallie, “I was really pleased. I thought we did the little things really well and created lots of really dangerous moments and I was pleased with that. I thought our midfielders played really hard, especially our eights. Brooks and Brandon had fantastic games, defended well, connected passes."
He continued, "Our forwards did a great job of creating chances. I though it was a real standout performance by Darius Ochere in the back. Alberth is such a dangerous player and Darius stood there and won the ball off him a number of times and played really well. We have a ton of respect for Alberth and to see how Darius played against him tonight was really encouraging. All of those guys again are new to the back line this year, and they have really stepped in and grown into the game and become better players. They also can connect passes and e part of the attack. So, I’m super proud of those guys.”
Curtis Blair, who has been the coach of Baylor for several years as well, spoke on his thoughts of the game and how his team, as well as McCallie, played that night.
“I think that going into it we knew what McCallie was about," Coach Blair said, "They are very direct, and they are very good on set pieces. The first two goals were set pieces. I think we go over it and the difference today is they executed and we didn’t. we felt like we had the guys in the right spot, but we just didn’t defend set pieces and we got ourselves in a hole and it is hard to come out. In the second half just tried to throw numbers forward to get back into the game. We about did there for a second, but they were very direct, and we did not so a good job of winning the midfield.”
Baylor will go on to play Knox Webb again this Thursday and hope to find themselves winning again. McCallie, however, have a long-awaited break for the next few weeks.
Game Summary
McCallie 2 2 --4
Baylor 0 1 --1
Goal Scorers:
McCallie- Brandon Mathurin 2, Dylan Capazario, Richard Todd; Baylor- Phillipe Laforge.
Assists:
McCallie- Dylan Capazario; Baylor- Harlan Watson-Brown.
Email Alex McElyea at alexmcelyea26@gmail.com)