Rivalry games are always intense: from Chelsea and Arsenal to Sporting and the Chicago Fire, a good game can always expected from both sides. The September 19 contest between the BS Wildcats soccer team and their cross town rivals the BSS Jaguars was no exception.

The rivalry matchup, combined with this being the senior’s last home game against their cross town rivals pushed the Cats to make this as competitive as possible.

“This was our last year and our last home game against South…it was a pretty intense but good game,” senior Logan Bradley said.

Early on the game, the Cats got down 1-0, but later tied it up 1-1. A Jaguar goal left the Cats with a  2-1 deficit, and from that point things took a rough turn for the the Cats. On a push to the goal from the BSS forward line, the Cats lost their starting goalkeeper Jake Williams as he was forced to leave the game with a mild injury.

“It hurts losing Jacob cause he is such a good goalie but Max stepped right up and did really well in his first real varsity game,” senior Adam Fencl said.

Coming to the close of the half the score was 2-1 and the Cats had never felt more confident about a South game that they could win.

“Being down 2-1 in the game the guys really felt like they were in it. last time we played them they got on top of us early like 3-0 and we just felt like we couldn’t come back from that, where this time there was a new attitude,” Head Coach Michael Palermo said.

Coach Palermo was encouraged by not only his team’s play, but their attitudes as well.

“They (the players) did most of the talking, they were the one’s pumping each other up. I think we felt a switch where this new passion exploded out and I think that it took a Blue Springs South team to get that out of some of the guys,” he said.

Entering the second half, the wildcat started strong by putting a large amount of pressure on the South goalkeeper, but unfortunately they were not able to capitalize; meanwhile, south was able to add another goal to their side, pulling ahead 3-1. With 15 minutes left in the match, things started get to interesting with both sides starting to emotionally lose control.

soccer is harder than other sports because we can’t just call a timeout and tell our guys to calm down. That is why tempers flare so much in soccer because there is no way to stop the game. We aren’t a physical team to begin with-we are a discipline team,” Coach Palermo said. Adding that his team is usually pretty well behaved, he noted that he figured BSS would try to get the Wildcats off their game and cited some borderline calls for the loss of composure on both sides. “I think the longer we played the more the frustration was building on their side not as much on our side,” he added.

Having players like Fencl leading the Cats on sideline helped keep their emotions under control.

“It’s hard because it’s a rivalry game and everyone wants it so bad but at the end of the day you have to keep your composure and you can’t let a silly foul bring you out of the game. Being on the sidelines, it’s harder than being on the field because  I can walk up to my starting freshman defender and tell him to keep calm,” Fencl said

In addition to Fencl, Bradley helped keep the Cats stay under control on the field as South really started to get aggressive.

“In that game we had some new people being put into a varsity game and especially against South it’s hard thing to do just told them to relax and that everybody makes mistakes and just try to fix them,” Bradley said.

Even through strong performances from Bradley and Williams, the Cats were not able to capitalize on a few key moments and ultimately fell 3-1. The Cats are now 4-8. Their next home game will be October 1 against Lee’s Summit West.