Nelson’s brace lifts Jackson past tough, defense-minded Saxony Lutheran

A near-perfect defensive scheme from Saxony Lutheran held the visiting Jackson Indians girls’ soccer team scoreless for the opening half.

For the second consecutive night, Jackson went scoreless in the opening 40 minutes. However, a few halftime adjustments opened the door for new offensive success and, despite allowing a Crusader goal, allowed the Indians to come away with a 3-1 victory.

"I'm not gonna say we outworked them, because they're a very hard-working team,” Crusaders coach Chris Crawford said. “Coach [McMullen] has them playing really well. But I think we matched that intensity, and it's hard to do.

“They fly at you from a million different spots. They have a lot of good players. They're very disciplined. They're very well-coached. Our girls executed the game plan, especially in the first half. We executed our game plan to a tee, and we played the way we want to play.”

With the wind pelting and negating most of each team’s attempts at passing through the air, both teams struggled to find the net in the first half but opened the second half with rapid-fire scoring. All four combined goals came in the first 20 minutes of the second half.

“We had to adjust to some situations, but it's good for us to have to do that,” Indians coach Justin McMullen said. “Not every game is going to be on a perfect surface, and obviously, in spring sports, the conditions are gonna be kind of unpredictable.

“We had to adjust to that, but give Saxony all the credit. They came out and they had a really good game plan against us. It took us a little bit to kind of adapt to that, but I think overall though, you know, I was happy with the end result.”

After a slow first half, the second half opened with fireworks as the teams combined for three goals in three minutes – two from Jackson, one from Saxony Lutheran – with both teams finding chinks in the other’s armor.

Senior forward Justi Nelson’s brace propelled the Indians to their fifth victory in as many games, scoring the first and third goals early in the second half, while junior Lauren Marchi struck for the second Jackson goal of the three-goal frenzy.

“My biggest thing was to just relax and be patient because we're willing to go through those things,” McMullen said. “We're not gonna go out and score five, six goals every game. It's one of those things that we have to learn early in the season.”

McMullen came prepared for a fight from the Crusaders, marking the game as a big fixture on the week’s schedule while noting great coaching and anticipating that Saxony Lutheran would come with a strong game plan. With strong winds and a tight, physical Crusaders defense, Jackson faced a tough test from its first in-county opponent of the season.

“They made us work, and I knew they would,” McMullen said. “They're well-coached, and they have good kids that buy into the system. Anytime that happens, you don't take anyone for granted. You have to mention teams like this when they're coached like they are and they have the kids that are gonna play hard.”

Despite the loss, a tough and tested Saxony Lutheran team emerged from the game with a few high points, mainly in executing a strong game plan against a much larger opponent in Jackson.

Games like the Jackson matchup help the Crusaders later on, preparing them for a postseason run against teams similar in size.

"Our schedule is on purpose to play the bigger, faster, stronger teams before the postseason so that we're not shocked when we run into somebody like that,” Crawford said. “That's kind of how we set our schedule. We're getting better every day, which is what we want – especially early in the season.”