Kennedy regroups in second half for substate semifinal win over Jefferson

CEDAR RAPIDS — Down in the locker rooms underneath Kingston Stadium, Cedar Rapids Kennedy forward Joachim Kikuni wasn't happy.

Kikuni and the Cougars were down 1-0 to Cedar Rapids Jefferson at halftime of their Class 3A substate semifinal, a game they felt they could win. But for the first 40 minutes, things weren't falling Kennedy's way.

So Kikuni took matters into his own hands. Just minutes into the second half, the senior broke out into open field and found the back of the net. Then, just four minutes later, senior Amadou Kujabi drilled a free kick in for a goal. Just like that, the Cougars were back in control.

'We didn't give it our best the way we can (in the first half),' Kikuni said. 'We thought that we were just going to win, which is why we didn't give it all we got. We didn't play like we're supposed to do. Then we came back and we did it.'

Kennedy held on in the remaining 30 minutes of the match to beat the J-Hawks 2-1, earning a trip to the substate final where it will play No. 1 Cedar Rapids Prairie on Saturday at 9 a.m.

The slow start on Wednesday, Kennedy Coach Adrian Evans believed, was simply nerves. Evans sat his team down at halftime and preached the basics, just trying to get them to get back to the game plan.

That must have been all it took.

'It was nice to see our guys come out in the second half and really start to put the pressure on like we knew we could play,' Evans said. 'We've got a lot of young kids on our team, and I think that first half was just kind of the substate jitters.'

The road ahead, though, doesn't get any easier for the Cougars. They're tasked with Prairie, which beat Marshalltown on Wednesday 2-1 to continue its undefeated season.

Evans knows that it'll take a little something extra if they're going to knock off the top-ranked team on the road — but it's a challenge he's looking forward to.

'They're a completely different team,' Evans said. 'So it's going to be a lot of sitting down with the players ... and just trying to come up with a game plan that we can use where we can maximize the benefits of us working as a team and kind of minimize our mistakes so they can't do that to us.'

WATERLOO WEST 2, CEDAR RAPIDS WASHINGTON 1

No. 12 Cedar Rapids Washington took on Waterloo West in the opener at Kingston Stadium in a game that went right down to the wire. With less than 10 seconds left in the game and the score tied 1-1, Waterloo West sophomore Tristyn Schunk-Kososkie brought the ball down the right side of the field. About 30 yards out from the goal, he went to cross the ball in front of the goal.

The cross went off the mark — but for the better. The ball sailed just over the goalkeeper's hands into the upper corner of the goal, sealing the 2-1 win for the Wahawks.

'They did a good job just trying to get a ball in the box so they could score,' Washington Coach JP Graham said. 'It was kind of an unfortunate cross. It was one of those ones that it was kind of a mistake and it goes over your keeper's head.'

Waterloo West, which lost to the Warriors 5-0 in the regular season, didn't change anything in particular, Coach Michael Penning said. It was just a heightened sense of urgency that pushed his team ahead, and that's something he hopes to continue on Saturday against Iowa City West in the substate final.

'I guess we just showed up,' Penning said. 'They're a real good team, and if you don't show up, they're going to take advantage of it and score a lot of goals on you for sure. It was nice to come out and play our style and kind of take it to them a little bit at times.'

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