ARGOS – A relentless push of the offense and an avalanche of goals in the final minutes left no doubt in an Argos 7-0 win over Winamac in sectional title action at Argos. It capped a winning day for Argos as the Lady Dragons took an identical 7-0 win earlier in the day at their sectional final at LaVille.
In big games, big time athletes step up and for Argos it was a hat trick from Chino Roque that was the difference. Actually his goal at 28:37 in the first half would prove to be enough for the title. His pair in the second half opened the floodgates.
“Sometimes it’s ‘where is Chino?’ tonight they knew,” said Argos head coach Todd Vanderweele. “I have to give Winamac credit we had all that pressure but we were only up 1-0 at half and then when he hit the second one it just kind of opened things up.
“He’s very good at reading where the ball is going, he anticipates so well and knows the game so well, he’s able to read defenses,” said Vanderweele. “Sometimes bigger stronger kids can keep him from doing what he wants to do and give him some fits but when he can do what he wants to do he can rip defenses open very easily.”
He wasn’t the only Dragon ripping at Winamac’s defense. The Warriors spent most of their time just trying to keep the Argos offense at the mid field line and could manage just a run or two of their own at the goal. It was the common theme of the game as nearly the entire 80 minutes was played between the center stripe and the goal line for the Dragons.
“We told our guys we needed to be all over them from the get go,” said Vanderweele. “Against North Miami we scored the three goals early and then kind of took our foot off the pedal and not that we gave anything to them, but it got kind of sloppy and tonight we said we needed to be all over them for 80 minutes.”
“I knew if we pressured them the way we could, with our experience we could pull it off.”
Pull it off they did and unfortunately for Winamac goalie Carter Hettinger, it was a free for all for the Dragon offense at around the 25 minute mark in the second half.
Roque scored his third goal to make it 3-0 at 25:17. Cameron Markley added another three minutes later.
Then it was open season for senior Lane Bollenbacher who scored a hat trick of his own in just a three minute span. His first came at 10:41 and the last at 7:28.
While not tested for much of the night, the Argos defensive back line was very visible in the confidence they gave their midfielders and front men to continuously attack the goal.
“Part of the strength of our defense is Sam Manikowski and Owen Nifong,” said Vanderweele. “Those guys are very athletic and they are very good in the air. We have been able to take other teams out of their attack because they tried to play the ball over the top and you just can’t do it because they are so good in the air and good at finding our mid fielders.”
The Dragons move to 12-3-4 on the year and will take on the still to be determined winner at Central Noble at Argos on Saturday.
•Argos 7 Winamac 0
at Argos
First Half
Argos
Chino Roque 12th
Second half
Argos Roque (Lukas VanDerWeele) 45th
Argos Roque (Tim Ahlemeyer) 55th
Argos Cam Markley (VanDerWeele) 59th
Argos Lane Bollenbacher (Gabe Stone) 70th
Argos Bollenbacher (Mike Richard) 72nd
Argos Bollenbacher 73rd
Shots on goal: Argos-11, Winamac-0
Saves: Winamac-4 (Carter Hettinger)
Corners: Argos 7, Winamac 2
Records: Argos 12-3-4, Winamac 7-11-1
