Big Red boys win East District title

DISTRICT CHAMPS — The Big Red boys soccer team celebrates winning the Division III, East District championship with a 1-0 win over John Glenn Thursday night at St. Clairville’s Red Devil Stadium. – Andrew Grimm

ST. CLAIRSVILLE — Sometimes all it takes is one.

In a battle of teams that were full of offensive talent and average better than four goals per game, one being enough to win did not seem all that likely coming into Thursday’s Division III, East District championship between Big Red and John Glenn at Red Devil Stadium.

But, as often is the case in the unpredictable thing called the tournament, that’s indeed all it took for Big Red to capture the district title.

Steubenville, the No. 2 seed, weathered an early push from the top-seeded Muskies and netted the game’s only goal late in the first half, then made it stand up to win its second district championship in three years in a nail-biter.

“We didn’t expect to play that 1-0,” Big Red head coach Greg Bowers said. “They had the district player of the year, William Nicolozakes, who had (34) goals and to hold him and them scoreless is saying something.

“They did a good job defending us, we had some unlucky bounces, but we executed our game plan and this time of the year is all about finding a way to win.

“I’m proud of our guys’ effort, they were focused all week and now they’re district champions. It was just a great team effort.”

After Big Red (13-3-3) started to create some opportunities as the first half moved along, they broke through when Brady Dinovo connected from in close off an assist from Hayden Hicks with less than three minutes to play in the opening half for what proved to be the only goal.

Big Red had a couple of quality chances to add to the lead, and John Glenn (15-4-1) had a few looks to tie it in the second half, but Dinovo’s tally proved to be the only one to find the twine.

Big Red keeper Robby Lucas made six saves in net for the shutout, the seventh goose egg put up by Big Red this season. He made a big stop inside nine minutes to go to preserve the win.

Steubenville advances to the regional tournament, where it will take on the Southeast District winner on Wednesday in Athens. That district final between Marietta and Chillicothe will be played Saturday.