MANTUA–Crestwood opened Chagrin Valley Conference play with a dominant 11-0 win over visiting Jefferson on Tuesday.
Early game action was competitive with both sides battling near midfield and looking to establish ball control. In the seventh minute of the first half, Crestwood was able to take control on sophomore Kyle Shelhamer’s goal and never looked back.
“Happy at the complete team effort we gave tonight,” said Crestwood coach Eric Sway. “If we can get this consistently, we are going to be tough to beat.”
Crestwood continued the scoring when senior Elijah Jurisch scored his first goal at the 19:13 mark of the first half. Only a few minutes later, sophomore Dakota Powers scored back-to-back goals within 20 seconds of each other in the 22nd minute.
Before the first half was over, A.J. Brock and Shelhamer scored again to increase Crestwood’s lead to 6-0 heading into the 31st minute.
Although Crestwood led at the half, Coach Sway and his team were not satisfied and focused on improving in the second half.
“There were a few things we wanted to change at halftime that we didn’t like in the first half,” Sway said. “One, I think you saw when we came out for the second half that those changes were made.”
The Red Devils also increased their intensity and fought harder for loose balls.
“I thought, in the first half, our aggressiveness was down, on 50-50s we didn’t do much, but in the second half we came out way better and more aggressive,” Powers said.
Jurisch, who scored three goals with five assists, also thought the Red Devils played better in the second half.
“I thought the first half we played a little slow,” he said. “In the second half, we came out and knew we had to play off of each other and could score some easy goals. We had a lot of fun playing off of each other. It made the game much simpler.”
The second half started fast for Crestwood with Jurisch scoring his second goal at the 1:57 mark.
Crestwood continued the run with a third goal each for Jurisch, Shelhamer and Powers, all finishing the night with a hat trick. Jurisch also added five assists, while Shelhamer, Issac Sienger, and Cooper Pausch all assisted one goal.
As the second half continued, Crestwood utilized its depth bringing reserves in to finish the game and giving some well-deserved rest to their starters.
“We are pretty confident,” Sway said of his reserves. “They have gotten a lot more minutes already this year than we expected because of the results you see on the scoreboard.”
Despite the lopsided score, Jefferson played hard throughout.
“(Jefferson) never gave up, and that’s what you want to see regardless of who’s winning or who’s losing,” Sway said. “You just want to see the kids compete.”
Crestwood’s offense was dominant throughout, but Sway also recognized his defense’s stellar performance.
“We have three guys who have been playing together now for three years and most of those guys play the whole game,” Jurisch said. “Kade (Rotter), Sam (Wright), and Drew (Pfost), they do all the dirty work, and all the other guys get all the accolades.”
With the win, Crestwood improved to 2-1 on the season with a home game against Ravenna on Thursday. The Red Devils wanted to kick off conference play with a bang and consider that mission accomplished.
“We are going to have some tough games in the conference, and we know that,” Sway said. “We did want to make a little bit of a statement within the CVC as well just to let them know, we are here this year.”
