Wrapping up their fourth straight KJCCC title on a rain-soaked home pitch, the No. 5 Neosho County Panthers blanked the Kansas City Kansas Blue Devils, 3-nil, on Saturday afternoon.
The victory, which improved Neosho County’s unbeaten record to 12-0-3 overall and 6-0-2 in conference play, secured the Panthers’ outright KJCCC crown.
“It shows that we’ve got the consistency,” Neosho County head coach Elliot Chadderton said. “If you continue to win games and do things properly, and the guys buy in, that’s what’s most important. Now we’re concentrating on the postseason and continuing to win games.”
Neosho County scored all of its goals in the first half, netting a pair from Callum Niven and another from Keane Hazeldine.
“We had a deep conversation this morning about the way we’ve started our last two games,” Chadderton said. “We’ve conceded early in two games in a row. So there was a huge emphasis on the first 15 minutes and doing the right things. We showed that we punish teams early.”
Niven, the sophomore NJCAA All-American striker, recently set the school record for goals in a career.
“The hardest part of the game is to put the ball in the back of the net,” Chadderton said. “Now he’s scored 36 goals in 36 games. Averaging a goal a game is very hard to do. So we’ve got to continue to feed the ball to him.”
However, Niven is facing his second yellow card suspension after picking up his eighth of the year against Kansas City.
Chadderton said that Niven intentionally drew the card to reset his card count and miss the final regular season match — he’ll face a suspension in the postseason if he picks up two more yellows rather than being one away.
“He was going to get a yellow at some point today,” Chadderton said. “That way, he can be refreshed for the postseason. Nothing wipes, so that’s why we’ve got to be strategic about it.”
Minimizing his bookings is a point of emphasis for the Panthers as the postseason approaches.
“That’s on him. He’s got to figure it out and make sure he’s smart,” Chadderton said. “He’s a target because everybody knows he’s a good player. He’s got to be clever with how he plays while continuing to play with the same aggression that’s made him successful. He’s a smart player, he’ll figure it out.”
Goalkeeper Josh Bogan saved eight shots on goal delivered by Kansas City Kansas in Saturday’s shutout. Malique Roach contributed two assists.
Up next
Neosho County hits the road for the regular season finale against Crowder on Tuesday.
“We won’t be taking our foot off the gas,” Chadderton said. “We’ll go in with our best team. It’s all about our mentality.”
The Panthers, the reigning national runners- up, enter the postseason after the Crowder match as the top seed in the NJCAA Region VI Tournament.
“We’ve got to take care of the games before us,” Chadderton said. “One slip up can cost us the season. If we continue to take it a game at a time, we’ll take care of business. So we’ll hit the ground running.”
