It didn’t take long for Albemarle to get on the board. But Riverbend answered to keep it even going into the break. Again, the Patriots wasted little time in the second half jumping out in front, but again, the Bears found an answer. With just under 20 minutes to go Albemarle jumped back out in front one final time, and this go around, the Patriots defense held strong with Matt Natale coming up huge in the home stretch to preserve a 3-2 win.
“Riverbend is a good team and we’re kind of mirror images of each other, trying to do a lot of possession and I feel like its fun to watch these two teams play,” said Albemarle coach Scott Jackson. “This team has a lot of upperclassmen so as coaches we don’t want to instruct too much in the game. (With the back-and-forth) we just told them that they had to go out there and find a way win.”
To open up the first half, Perry Rowen was on the receiving end of a perfectly placed cross from Alex Bohn and the co-captain put it the back of the net to make it 1-0. But the Bears made it 1-1 on when Ben Gallick punched home a cross.
To begin the second, Shane Rose managed to draw a penalty on a break away to earn a penalty, something he capitalized on to make it 2-1 when he went to the bottom right corner of the goal.
“On the PK usually I go lower left, but I missed one last night up at North Stafford,” Rose said. “So I decided to switch it up, and the keeper guess that I was going right, but it still slid passed him.”
The Bears made it 2-2 on an unreal play off a thrown in that more resembled a well-struck corner kick than anything launched in from the sideline. Riverbend’s Jason Cullinan sat behind the defense and headed the ball in to the top left corner.
“When you have a guy that throws the ball a country mile, that catches you off guard,” Jackson said. “We did not see that coming.”
For the next five minutes the Patriots pounded on the door with a trio of chances that looked like sure-fire goals, but the ball simple would not bounce their way until Bohn put a pass on Luke Fatton’s foot. With 19 minutes to go, Fatton punched it through but not without a collision from the defense which was playing way upfront trying to beat him to the shot.
“Bohn was making a lot of great passes all game and we weren’t getting to all of them,” Fatton said. “This time it worked, just a beautiful pass so I just had to finish. It was easy except the collision. The credit goes to Bohn though for that pass.”
The last ten minutes the Bears poured it on, but between a trio of Natale saves and Rose’s play in the middle of the field, Albemarle would not allow the equalizer.
“To be honest, we would have liked to have seen more possession to close the game out,” Jackson said. “They’re a dangerous team and had a lot of chances there at the end. I think we need to be a little more composed there at the end, but it was still fun.”
Rose was on the receiving end of a nasty play at midfield that drew a yellow card, but managed to finish the game playing the way he did before, with reckless abandon and at an impressive pace.
“You go in there and try and win as many 50-50’s as you can,” Rose said. “If you don’t then they’ll be coming at us countering, so I go in there hard and it’s just ended out working out for me.”
Natale finished with four saves on the night.
Albemarle (11-2-1) plays Mountain View on Tuesday at home at 7 p.m. for its senior night.
