By Mark Carpenter
People’s Defender
Fortunes have not been kind in recent years to the West Union High School boys soccer program but under the direction of head coach Tom Wuest and assistant Silas Mills, the Dragons have begun to reverse those fortunes in their favor. As this issue goes to press, the Dragons stood at 3-1-1 for the 2023 season after picking up wins over Eastern Brown and Wellston, the former being a victory in Southern Hills Athletic Conference play. The West Union squad was led in the two wins by senior Arbutus Wuest, who scored a very impressive nine goals in the two contests, quite likely a West Union school record.
On September 6, the Dragons hosted the Eastern Brown Warriors in SHAC Action and send the Warriors back to Brown County stinging from a 5-1 defeat.
West Union got the scoring started against Eastern, getting a goal from senior Trey Bracken off a Logan Caldwell assist at the 29:30 mark of the first half and followed that up eight minutes later with the first Wuest score of the night to grab a 2-0 advantage. The Warriors managed to sneak one past West Union keeper Brylee Mills with 11 minutes left in the first half but that was all they got past Mills for the remainder of the contest.
With just 1:46 left in the half, Wuest got past the Eastern defense and found himself one-one-one with Warriors; goalie Carson McCord and it was no contest as Wuest blasted his second goal of the game for a 3-1 West Union halftime lead.
The second half belonged to Wuest as he added two more goals while the West Union defense, led by Nate Fooce and James Smith supporting Mills between the pipes, kept the Warriors off the board. Wuest finished the game with four goals while Mills finished with 16 saves.
“The Dragons showed out on the pitch tonight,” assistant coach Mills told The Defender. “This team has inexperienced players across the roster but they work so hard in practice and play with more heart than I’ve seen in a long time. We are slowly becoming the team we had envisioned before the season started. We need to improve on our communication and learn not to let off the gas in the latter part of the game but we are learning and getting better every time out.”
The following evening the Dragons made the long trip to Wellston High School to face off with the host Golden Rockets and came back home with their third consecutive win, a 6-2 triumph. Arbutus Wuest again led the way, finding the back of the net five time to make it nine goals in two days. The other West Union goal came from Dalton Shupert with James Smith and Trey Bracken adding assists. In goal, Mills finished the game with 9 saves.
With the 3-1-1 record, the Dragons will face their toughest challenge of the season when they will host the once-beaten and unbeaten in conference play North Adams Green Devils on Wednesday, September 13.
In the girls game with Eastern Brown, it was the Lady Warriors handing West Union an 11-0 defeat, led by four goals from senior Emma Litzinger and three from former Lady Dragon Katie Hunter. Playing shorthanded each game, the Lady Dragons are still searching for an elusive first victory.