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By Brian Pitts

Enterprise Record

There are two ways to look at Davie’s varsity soccer team in the Central Piedmont Conference standings, and the two views sit at opposite ends of the sports spectrum.

The dark view: Davie entered the week 0-4 in the league.

The rosy view: Davie’s CPC losses are by a total of seven goals.

First-year coach Corbin Kopetzky took solace in the skinny margins last week – 1-0 at Reagan and 2-1 at Mt. Tabor. The War Eagles, who haven’t finished better than fifth place since 2005, are closing the gap.

“I told the girls: ‘You’re going from five- and six-goal losses to competing with them,’” Kopetzky said. “That’s progress. I didn’t take over the team to go undefeated and win a conference title in the first year. I took over the team to see improvement, and we’ve improved and we’ll continue to improve.”

Reagan 1, Davie 0

It wasn’t anything new, but the War Eagles played defense like crazy in Pfafftown on March 28.

“The back four do their job night in and night out,” Kopetzky said. “We changed formations, so it kind of took the safety net part away, and they still played pretty well. So they’re pretty stellar back there.”

The only goal was scored in the first half. Both teams had about the same number of opportunities.

“We were pretty evenly matched,” he said. “We had six shots. They didn’t really shoot on us in the second half, and we didn’t really shoot on them. It was a good matchup.”

The Raiders got their goal on a penalty kick. Avery Yount, who made seven saves, knocked it away, only to see Reagan convert the rebound.

“Avery came out and made a good play,” he said. “She saved it, but they scored off the rebound. Saving it is kind of rare; it’s the hardest shot to save. They’re only about 12-14 yards out.”

Kopetzky heaped praise on junior Riley Almond, who doubles as a track-and-field athlete.

“She gets thrown around the field a lot – wherever I need her – and she doesn’t complain,” he said. “She just goes to work. She held up well in the midfield. She got some big steals and made some good runs. I’m very high on her, and she’s doing it while playing two sports at the same time.”

The next day, the Raiders (5-6, 2-2 CPC) dropped a 3-2 decision at West Forsyth.

Tabor 2, Davie 1

The War Eagles did a lot of things well at Mt. Tabor on March 30. They nearly beat Tabor for just the third time in 45 tries, but it wasn’t meant to be as the Spartans scored the tiebreaking goal in the final minute.

“We played great,” Kopetzky said. “(In the last minute) we played a ball that unluckily went right to a Tabor player, and they placed the shot nicely in the bottom left corner.”

Tabor had a 1-0 first-half lead when it was guilty of a handball in the box. Lexi Kulis, the team’s top scorer, deposited the PK to tie the score.

“Lexi is my go-to for those,” he said after her seventh goal. “She gets nervous but I tell her: ‘If I didn’t trust you to execute, you wouldn’t be in that spot.’”

Notes: After losing 5-0 to West Forsyth, 1-0 to Reynolds and 2-0 to East Forsyth, Tabor improved to 5-5-1, 1-3. … Davie is 3-5-2 overall. … This was the first Davie-Tabor meeting since 2017. … Davie’s JV lost 7-0 at Reagan.