TUMWATER — Tumwater coach John Hayes kept it blunt when talking about how his team looked in the first 40 minutes against North Thurston on Tuesday in Tumwater.
“The first half was horrible,” Hayes said. “They just knocked it around us, and we kind of just followed.”
At halftime, Hayes and his staff stressed the importance of running straight at the North Thurston defense, something that Isaak Djigal took to heart immediately out of the break.
The senior forward scored just 30 seconds into the second half, and the 1-1 scoreline stood until the game’s final whistle.
It’s the T-Birds second straight draw, as they also finished a game 1-1 against Steilacoom on Monday on the Tumwater District Stadium turf.
“They locked in, and it was a good game,” Hayes said. “I saw guys that reacted right away to what their coaching staff asked them to do … Just run like chaos, win balls, and put pressure on. And that’s what they do.”
North Thurston didn’t score in the first half as quickly as Djigal did in the second half, but it wasn’t as far off as Hayes would have liked.
The Rams were able to split Tumwater’s defensive center mids and promptly place a shot near the back post to go up 1-0 just four minutes in.
As a former forward, Hayes says it’s a shot that the Rams should have converted on, so he didn’t blame Grady Harroun, his keeper, for allowing the goal.
Harroun didn’t let the goal get to him either. He made several saves throughout the rest of the first half to keep the deficit at one, and after Djigal tied the game, he made several more throughout the second half to keep the game deadlocked.
Hayes said that the Tumwater bench didn’t track official save stats live, but he mentally had Harroun around 16.
“He came up big when he needed to,” Hayes said. “The second half, he came up four or five times, and even ones that just went by, he covered very well. Really proud of his play today. He’s stepped it up. We’ve been looking forward to it.”
The Tumwater back line responded well after the early gaffe as well, limiting North Thurston’s chances to several long shots instead of Grade-A chances.
Freshman Issac Rock excelled at right back, playing what Hayes called one of the best games he’s ever seen in the back half.
“He just was solid all game,” Hayes said. “They couldn’t get around him, they couldn’t get by him. He had a great game. I was really proud of him. Sometimes it’s tough as a freshman to step in … He played one heck of a game.”
The matchup with North Thurston is the fourth of a challenging five-game non-league slate to open the season. It’s been a bag of mixed results, as a 3-0 win over Yelm and a 2-1 loss to Capital preceded the draws with Steilacoom and North Thurston, but Hayes has been pleased with the early progress he’s seen from a group that is a solid mix of upper and underclassmen.
“They are 100 percent a team,” Hayes said. “No one is above anyone else. They all get along with each other. Everything is just molding and gelling like it should be and like you want it to do as a coach.”
Tumwater’s (1-1-2) next test will come against Olympia at home on Saturday. Olympia and North Thurston played to a scoreless draw themselves on March 10.
“It goes to show, for years in Thurston County, there’s been a couple teams that are up there in soccer, and then the rest,” Hayes said. “Now it's pretty equal across the board. I love seeing it.”
After Saturday’s matchup, the T-Birds will begin league play in Shelton next Tuesday, March 24.
