Soccer Preview: Hopewell vs. Ellwood City
Hopewell is 6-0 against Ellwood City since September of 2019, and they'll have a chance to extend that success on Saturday. The Hopewell Vikings have the luxury of staying home for another game and will welcome the Ellwood City Wolverine at 12:00 p.m. Hopewell is strutting in with some offensive muscle as they've averaged 3.7 goals per game this season.
Ellwood City better have a healthy lead at halftime, because if last week is any indication, that's when Hopewell really get things going. Hopewell's defense stepped up to hand Mohawk Area a 7-0 shutout on Thursday. Considering the Vikings have won five matches by more than four goals this season, Thursday's blowout was nothing new.
They hit Mohawk Area with a four-pronged attack, as the team got scores from
Ronald Bushnell (3),
Rocco Marcantonio (2),
Nico Crivelli, and
Michael DiNardo.
Meanwhile, Ellwood City was not able to break out of their rough patch last Tuesday as the team picked up their 11th straight defeat. They lost 12-0 to Central Valley. While losing is never fun, the Wolverine can't take it too hard given the team's big disadvantage in MaxPreps' Pennsylvania soccer rankings (they are ranked 554th, while the Warriors are ranked 161st).
The victory got Hopewell back to even at 7-7. As for Ellwood City, their loss dropped their record down to 0-11.
Hopewell took their win against Ellwood City in their previous matchup back in August by a conclusive 8-0. Will Hopewell repeat their success, or does Ellwood City have a new game plan this time around? We'll find out soon enough.
Article generated by infoSentience based on data entered on MaxPreps
