BELLEVILLE - Owen Logan scored a golden goal in the 83rd minute to give Edwardsville a 2-1 win over Belleville Althoff Catholic in the Metro Cup Showcase event Wednesday night at Althoff's stadium.
The win was the second straight for the Tigers to open the season against quality opposition in a very well-played match by both sides.
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"It was a very well-played game, very competitive," said Edwardsville head coach Mark Heiderscheid. "We were under a lot of pressure, because Althoff is a great, physical who pressured well and very dangerous on set pieces. In this case, I thought the players dealt very well with the pressure and we were able to create some good chances ourselves. And fortunately, one of those chances went into the back of the net."
The Crusaders got the first goal of the match after 25 minutes when Dylan Ysursa drilled home a goal from distance off a free kick to give Althoff the lead at 1-0. The Tigers were able to equalize in the 31st minute off a goal from Berik Selberg after getting a nice feed from Sam Reeder and scored off a break to draw Edwardsville level at 1-1.
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Both teams had very good chances to score a potential winner in the second half, with regulation ending at 1-1, forcing two halves of extra time with a golden goal, the same as sudden-death overtime, where the first goal wins. It was Logan who put the ball past the Althoff keeper in the 83rd minute, when Selberg's pass went right to Logan, who hit the shot into the corner of the net to give the Tigers the 2-1 win.
Edwardsville is now 2-0-0 to start the season, having defeated a good Springfield High team 2-0 in the season opener on Monday.
"We're pretty happy because Springfield in an awesome team," Heiderscheid said, "they're really well-coached and Althoff has to be one of the best teams in Southern Illinois."
The Tigers wrap up Metro Cup play Saturday evening against Granite City at Mascoutah in a 5 p.m. kickoff and Heiderscheid is looking forward to a very good game against the Warriors.and their head coach, who's a link to Granite's glorious past.
"Ryan Reeves is the coach and he's a Granite City product," Heiderscheid said. "So I think that's really neat."
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