Bulldogs finish 6-5 overall, 6-2 in SMC
Boonville – After downing Blue Ridge in overtime to finish the regular season, the Murphy boys soccer team was assigned one of the wildcard spots in the N.C. High School Athletics Association 1A Boys Soccer Championships, drawing a first round matchup with top-seeded Starmount.
The Bulldogs traveled to face the Rams early last week, falling 3-0 on the road and ending a successful season with an effort which head coach Justin Butler said the team can be proud of.
“These guys were very much in it and gave a good fight against an obviously very solid team,” Butler said. “At no point was there any head hanging or wanting to quit, they knew they were playing a good team and it was a fantastic game. The score doesn’t really reflect the overall feel of that game. Even Starmount’s coach was telling us after the game, despite what the scoreboard said, he thought we were the toughest team that they had played all season. That’s a compliment to these guys and that was with a few players injured or sick. I’m very proud of the way that these guys played.”
Murphy finished the season with a winning record of 6-5 overall and a stellar Smoky Mountain Conference record of 6-2 in a season where the Bulldogs faced adversity from many different angles.
“It says a lot about the character that we have collectively as a team,” Butler said. “Starting the season with some tough losses and playing games with 10 players, it would’ve been very easy for the team collectively to just throw their hands up and say ‘Oh well, it’s just going to be a bad season.’ Between COVID, short men on the roster, shortened training season, shortened regular season, everything else, it would’ve been easy to just say, ‘It’s going to be a crazy year, we’ll just do what we can and be done.’ But they were never happy, it was always about us improving.”