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Weir Boys Fall in Regional Final to East Fairmont

Photo by Mike Mathison Weir’s Zach Hannah moves with the ball during Tuesday’s regional championship game.

FAIRMONT — The Weir boys’ soccer team just ran out of time.

East Fairmont scored twice within two minutes of the first half and hung on for a 2-1 victory against the Red Riders Tuesday evening at East-West Stadium in the West Virginia Class AA-A Region 1 championship.

The Bees are 19-0-4 and head to Beckley next week for the state championship.

“I knew we weren’t going to score on their keeper (Michael Gaskill) from 25 yards out,” Weir coach Jim Luevano said. “We didn’t have any quality shots outside the 18.

“I knew it was going to come down to scoring on these guys with junk in front of the net.

“We just didn’t get enough of that. There were a couple of misplayed balls in the second half, but no one there to capitalize on them.

“That’s how you score on teams like this. You let them misplay one little mistake and you capitalize on it.

“That’s how we scored and that’s how they scored on us.”

The Bees had allowed four goals all season and never more than one in a game.

“I knew their defense was strong,” Luevano said. “We got through balls on them and were able to somewhat break them down, but we didn’t get enough shots on goal to score.”

Weir’s Evan Gilbert scored off a Zach Hannah assist with 16:52 left to cut the lead to 2-1.

“It was good soccer both ways,” Luevano said. “I didn’t think the calls were great and I didn’t understand some of the calls at all. But, it is what it is.”

East Fairmont scored with 6:21 left in the first half when Evan Flohr found the back of the net. His header off a corner kick hit the post and is came back to him.

Andrew Slusser scored 120 seconds later from Logan Cerullo for a 2-0 cushion.

“You can’t bang the ball around four times in your own zone and someone not put it in the back of the net,” Luevano said. “A good team like that will capitalize on something like that and that’s what they did.”

The Red Riders had a few chances early, but couldn’t break through.

“We controlled the ball in the first half, passed well and had good through balls,” Luevano said. “Their goalie is tough. We needed to challenge him a little bit more, and test him. I thought we played well.

“They definitely marked up Michael Gresko well. Zach had a couple of good crosses, but the keeper was playing near post, so unless somebody got in front of him, we couldn’t capitalize.

“We said in the locker room (at halftime) that we had to get someone in front of him so he couldn’t just jump in on that ball. We had to either send it out further, or get in front of him.

“The second half we came out a little flat. But, once we got momentum going and control, I thought our team played well. We just didn’t have enough time on the clock to tie it up.

“I honestly think that we controlled the play. We knew what they were going to do. They were going to send long balls over the top and try to have their forwards run on them.

“Once we figured how to shut that down, it was no big deal.”

Weir loses four seniors off a 14-6 team — Hannah, Gresko, Luevano and Justin Roberts.

“We’re here to build the program and make them play good soccer. We have a couple of good guys who will step up and fill their positions. We had a heck of a season.

“We had a good group of boys. I’m very proud of them. I thought we played well down here.”

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