Charles City survives King & Queen comeback to sweep season series

Charles City goalkeeper Dominic Davis (left) dives to stuff a shot attempt by a King & Queen attacker.

Andre' Jones photo

Charles City’s soccer team entered Monday evening’s home contest looking to sweep King & Queen Tigers this season. After jumping out to a big lead early in the match, the Panthers withstood a late rally and used an expiring clock to come out victors.

Powered by Steven Trull’s hat trick and two additional goals from teammate DeAndre Gardner, Charles City sealed an 8-6 victory in the Tidewater District contest.

The hosts orchestrated an early attacking force in the match, with Trull notching his first goal less than five minutes into the contest. Three minutes later, teammate Bryan Carpio found the back-left side of the net to give Charles City a 2-0 advantage. After King & Queen scored a goal, Trull added two more within a four-minute span, notching the school’s first career hat trick. Gardner’s two goals quickly followed as the Panthers jumped to a 6-2 lead before settling with a 7-2 halftime advantage.

After Charles City’s Da’Sean Walker’s goal three minutes into the second half lifted the hosts advantage to six (8-2), King & Queen gradually cut the lead down. The Tigers added one goal after Walker’s score before unleashing a three-goal flurry within a 10-minute span to cut the deficit to two (8-6). However, the final whistle blew, and Charles City emerged with the win.

After the contest, Panthers’ head coach Grant Martin commented about his team’s aggressive attack to begin the game.

“We have played passive at times and I told them that we needed to be more aggressive,” said the victorious coach. “Tonight, we showed that with our early goals.

“Our confidence grows with each goal that we score and tonight it came in bunches,” Martin continued. “They forget how easy it can be to score when we work as a team.”

As far as King & Queen’s comeback, Martin hopes his team learned something from the Tigers’ resiliency.

“King & Queen played a great game and a lot of times when a team gets down like that, they cave in,” Martin added. “But they didn’t, and I hope it’s something that we can learn from because we’ll definitely be talking about it.”

Charles City’s record improves to 2-7 on the season.