It’s been a tough few weeks for Panther men’s soccer.
After opening their conference schedule with a pair of Mountain Seven wins, Franklin dropped three of their next four games to fall to the middle of the pack. With a 3-1 loss to East Henderson Oct. 4, Matt Kolodzik’s team fell to 3-4 in the conference with five Mountain Seven games to play.
“It was 2-0, and then we got one back in the second half,” said Kolodzik of freshman Kevin Torres’ beautiful strike from 40 yards. “We were pressing them pretty steadily, had quite a few opportunities, and a lot of shots off frame. That’s one of the things that we’ve worked on, is trying to take advantage and get better opportunities when they come along, and not just making it easier for them and taking a shot from distance as often. We’re looking to get that one extra pass, and the other end of that is to drive that ball in a little more often when we have the opportunity instead of bailing them out with a shot from distance.”
While Franklin has no shortage of players who can score from distance, as evidenced by Torres’ strike to the lower left corner, Kolodzik would like to see his team push some attacks further up the field. Especially in hostile away environments, one final pass can make all the difference.
“East is a good team – we beat them 3-1 here, and they beat us 3-1 at their place,” he said. “Typically, you get a little bit of a switch when you go from home to away. That’s expected, just not normally that much of a switch. Teams are taking advantage of our mistakes defensively. Most of these games that we’re playing, we’re outshooting them, we’re getting more shots on-and off-frame, but the question is, what are we doing with it?”
In winning all three of their conference games at home and losing all four of their conference games away, the Panthers have served as an extreme example of home-field advantage in action. While they face an uphill climb to compete for a Mountain Seven title, Kolodzik still feels bullish on their odds to qualify for the state playoffs.
“The updated rankings came out, and we’re still No. 16 in the [3A] West,” he said. “We have a good strength of schedule, we have a winning record. Last year, I believe six of the seven teams went to the playoffs, and I know there were some teams that had losing records that went to the playoffs last year. We don’t want to back our way into the playoffs; we want to earn our way into it, but right now we’re still sitting at a decent seed.”
Sitting at 7-6 overall, the Panthers continue their conference schedule this week, with matches at 0-5-1 Tuscola and home versus 7-0 Pisgah. After Pisgah, they’ll have just three more conference games left this regular season.