Metea Valley-Waubonsie Valley play to draw

Updated: October 6, 2011 9:04PM

As many times as the Metea Valley soccer team has lost on second half set pieces this season, it’s hard not to get down when it happens again.

But when Waubonsie Valley sophomore Noah Griffith scored off a set piece rebound in the 62nd minute, the Mustangs didn’t fold.

Metea, which has played arguably the toughest schedule in the region, got a rebound goal from Nate Donovan following a shot by Joel Schmidt with six minutes remaining to walk off the Waubonsie field in a 1-1 tie.

“We’ve been preaching resilience,” Mustangs head coach Josh Robinson said. “We’ve given up bad goals, we gave up another corner kick goal like always, but at least we were resilient enough to continue to fight.”

The two teams were scoreless through a half and only Waubonsie (7-6-3, 2-2-2 in the Upstate Eight) had a decent scoring opportunity.

Metea (5-6-4, 0-3-2) managed to put six shots on goal, most in the second half, but it was a Schmidt’s calm shot from 33 yards that hit off the crossbar and bounced once to a level that Donovan could easily head in on the rebound that changed the team’s demeanor.

“Joel took a great shot and (coach) Robinson was telling him to shoot all year,” Donovan said. “He finally hit one and it worked out.”

Griffith came on in the second half as a substitution at forward and immediately made his presence known with his speed.

On Warriors’ teammate Sam Bell’s corner, he was able to corral a miscleared ball at the top of the box and fire it back in low, where it was redirected into goal.

“Usually when I go in I just think there’s one opportunity in the game and you just have to take that one opportunity,” Griffith said. “You may only get one opportunity. The ball came to me and I scored.”

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