NASHVILLE
The Seymour boys soccer team was tired of going up against themselves on the practice pitch.
In their season-opener at Brown County — with 21 practices behind them — they could finally expend all their built-up energy and anticipation.
Seymour peppered the Eagles with 29 shots in a 9-0 drubbing on Thursday evening.
Daniel Hartman and Tyler Penegar had their way with the Eagles’ defense, as both finished with hat tricks in the contest.
“We stepped out there with a ton of energy today,” Owls coach Matt Dennis said. “We were talking form the get-go and brought extra guys in the attack. You saw a lot of guys having fun out there — in the first half, especially.”
The Owls scored their first goal just 49 seconds into the game.
Cole Fosbrink took a corner kick that landed at the near post, and Zach Moore gained possession and tucked the ball in to put the Owls up 1-0.
Penegar notched his first goal with 35:17 on the clock by cleaning up a rebound from 10 yards out.
Ethan Green went top-left shelf from 25 yards, and Hartman finished a cross by Charlie Galyen to extend the Owls lead to 4-0 by the 18-minutes mark.
Penegar fought through traffic and past the Eagles’ keeper for his second goal at 13:21.
With 5:05 left in the opening half, Hartman scored the Owls’ sixth goal on a cross by Brayan Morales.
Back-to-back goals from Hartman and Penegar — which gave both players their hat tricks — extended the Owls’ lead to 8-0 with 34:23 left in the game.
“We think they’re both going to score a lot of goals this year,” Dennis said. “We were hoping they would get off on the right foot, and I think they did today. Going forward, assuming we’re doing things the right way, I think we will find them scoring many more goals.”
A give-and-go led to the Owls final goal, with 4:18 left, as Galyen scored from five yards.
Fosbrink and Keegan Sunbury each had two assists, while Carter Wait, Brayan Morales and Galyen each tallied one.
Elliott Clark recorded the shutout, playing a full half, and junior Patrick DeBoor had one save for the Owls. Brown County took just five shots in the game.
This season, the Owls replace four graduated players in their starting lineup.
“What’s unique about this team is that we have so many guys coming back, and so many juniors,” Dennis said. “We have six seniors, 11 juniors and one sophomore on varsity. It’s looking pretty good for our future.
We even brought three junior varsity guys up today and got them about 30 minutes in the second half. They got quality touches with the first team and got to see what its like to play a varsity match. It was a really good way to kick off the season.”
The Owls (1-0) will play at Whiteland on Saturday morning.