The Ankeny Centennial boys’ soccer team will have a full week to figure out its offensive woes.
The Jaguars closed out the regular season on Friday with a third consecutive shutout loss, dropping a 2-0 decision at third-ranked Waukee Northwest. The Wolves finished 6-2 in the CIML Conference and improved to 12-3 overall, while Centennial’s records dropped to 2-5 and 5-11.
The Jaguars have lost four straight games since posting a 3-2 victory at then-No. 2 Johnston on April 23.
“Everything that we want to accomplish is still in front of us,” said Centennial coach Brian Duax. “If the best version of ourselves shows up, I don’t know if anybody can beat us. But, the problem is the consistency of our best version showing up.”
Northwest scored both of its goals in the second half, including one in the final minute. Ayden Gabrielson scored a goal and had an assist for the Wolves, who also got a goal from JT Spalding.
“I thought we played well. We just didn’t finish chances,” Duax said. “The score makes it look worse than what it was. They scored with 25 seconds to go when we were pushing everybody forward.”
Goalkeeper Andrew Nelson had four saves for the Jaguars, but it wasn’t enough.
“Overall, the performance was good,” Duax said. “It was two really good sides trying to pick each other apart. I would say the number of chances was pretty equal. The difference was that they finished a couple of them.
“We’re just struggling right now to put the ball in the goal, and we have way too much firepower going forward to not being scoring goals,” he added.
Centennial will play 10th-ranked Iowa City High (10-2) in a Class 4A substate semifinal on May 20. The site of that game will be determined in the next few days.
The Little Hawks started the season 8-0, but have lost two of their last four games–including a 6-3 decision to Cedar Rapids Washington on Friday.