Ocoee boys soccer battles through busy schedule

WINTER GARDEN — It’s been a busy stretch for the Ocoee boys soccer team, and through it, all the young Knights are continuing to improve.

Ocoee (5-2-3) played four games last week, picking up wins over The Master’s Academy and Lake Minneola on Monday and Tuesday, a 2-2 draw in a rivalry match against West Orange (3-1-3) on Friday and a 3-2 loss to Bishop Moore in a makeup game on Saturday afternoon.

During the match against the Warriors, played at West Orange, the Knights took the lead twice but also allowed tying goals each time within just a few minutes of their own score.

“I felt like we just gave a little bit of a letdown; we made a bad decision — a youthful decision that maybe a little more experience would have settled,” Peter Moore, the head coach for Ocoee, said about one of the goals his club allowed. “I thought we came back hard. … We fought through it, and that’s one thing this team has showed is a lot of fight all year.”

The Knights’ first goal came in the contest’s 17th minute, when Omar Ortega slipped one past the goalkeeper for West Orange. Ocoee’s second goal came in the 42nd minute via Adrian Lopez.

Each time, however, the Warriors’ Felipe Silva scored in reply just minutes later, with Moore diagnosing inexperience as one of the culprits.

“I probably had five sophomores on the field at any one time tonight, and I had a freshman out there all night,” Moore said.

The Knights have registered a few quality wins but also have yet to win — or lose — in district play. Ocoee’s three district matches as of press time have all been ties.

The Knights played at Lake Highland Prep on Tuesday and at Lake Nona on Wednesday after press time. They will play Dr. Phillips Dec. 12 at home.

Moore said he hoped the game at Lake Highland Prep, which, like West Orange, plays on a turf surface, would enable his team to get a bit more comfortable playing on turf — somewhere he believes they have struggled.

Speaking on Friday night before Saturday’s loss to the Hornets, Moore remarked that two wins, a loss and a tie wouldn’t be a bad week for his team during this busy stretch.

“My outlook is, on the next four games, I’d love to say we pick up four wins, but the realism is if we can pick up two wins, a tie, and a loss or two wins and two ties — that’s an excellent week for us on that schedule,” Moore said. “Then we get a little bit of a breather.”