RIDGELAND – It was a tale of two halves for the Northwest Mississippi Community College men's soccer team on Tuesday afternoon in their battle with the Holmes Community College Bulldogs, falling behind early but closing strong despite a 4-2 final that dropped the Rangers to 1-7 on in MACCC play this season.
The match opened with a few haymakers directed at the Rangers when the Holmes offense hit for three goals in the opening 17 minutes to put the visiting Northwest side on their back heels.
Northwest may have buckled but they didn't hit the canvas after the rocky start, leveling out their defense and for the next 28 minutes they gave themselves time to recover and even find a few counter strikes on offense that helped to even the flow of the match.
In the second half, it became their turn to try and level a few shots at the Bulldogs and taking advantage of that opportunity was Tendai Machingura who took the ball on the endline in the 52nd minute and after eluding multiple defenders was able to put the opening goal for the Rangers on the board to make it 3-1.
The game settled for the next 25 minutes into more of a back and forth in the midfield, but Northwest, while not getting many shot attempts in that period didn't give up many of their own until a flurry of shots on goal resulted in a strike for Holmes to make it 4-1.
While the Rangers were deflated for a brief period, it didn't last and in the 84th minute, one of the more brilliant shots of the season for Northwest was ripped off by Francisco Abmrioso as he buried a laser from 30-plus yards past the leaping goalie to cut the lead to 4-2.
Northwest couldn't add any more on, but the strike gave some life to team that hadn't found multiple goals in a conference game since their 5-2 win over East Mississippi Community College to open the conference slate.
The Rangers had plenty of positives to take away from the match including one of their higher corner kick tallies of the season with seven in the game and a pair of goals from unassisted chances created off dribbles or interceptions.
Northwest also won the second half 2-1 and saw some strong work in net by Jacob Little who made saves on five of six shots on goal after the opening salvo from Holmes.
The Rangers will need that momentum as they head into a crucial match with #7 Jones College next Tuesday on the road in Ellisville as they will look to spoil the Bobcats undefeated 5-0-1 conference record.
Information on that match and the full Northwest schedule can be found at nwccrangers.com or by following along with Ranger social media accounts.
