Dexter and Huron soccer battle to 1-1 tie in rain-soaked match

On a rain-soaked afternoon with offensive chances at a premium, it looked like a goal in the 65th minute would be all the Dexter High School girls soccer team needed to secure a win over Huron on its home field.

It proved not enough.

Huron (3-3-1) equalized on an unassisted goal from Ify Odum with less than six minutes to play and the Southeastern Conference cross-division rivals ended in a 1-1 tie.

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Dexter freshman Riley Doll broke a scoreless tie after a scramble inside the 18-yard box left her with an open look at goal that she didn’t let go to waste. The goal came against Huron’s backup goalkeeper Katie Yeatts, who was called into action unexpectedly after starting keeper Ariel Freed was issued a yellow card after colliding with a Dexter forward Bethany Shiguango outside of the goalie box on what would have been a breakaway.

Despite more than an hour on the bench in the rain and no time to warmup before entering the game, Yeatts was able to make a save on a set piece immediately after entering the game.

Most of Dexter's scoring opportunities came in the 10 minutes Yeatts was in, but Dexter coach Scott Forrester still said he would have liked to have seen his team attack with more urgency in the time Freed was relegated to the bench.

“I think with this team there needed to be a little bit more of a hunger at that point and put more pressure on their keeper that had to come off a little bit cold off the bench,” Forrester said. “I think we could have gotten that second goal that would have been the game winner.”

It looked like the one goal would be enough as promising Huron attacks following Dexter’s goal repeatedly ended in offsides calls or shots directly at Dexter keeper Stephanie Misevich.

Ironically, it was on a play where Huron’s offense didn’t build an attack at all that the equalizer came.

Odum stepped in front of a seemingly routine Dexter clearance, was able to control the deflection with her back to the goal, turn on her defender and beat Misevich with a shot to the low right side netting. It was a fantastic individual effort and tied the score with 5:22 remaining.

“Ify’s a great player and we expect her to do great things,” said Huron coach Steve Shelton. “It’s what I expect.”

Shelton was pleased with his team’s ability to come back late.

“This is the first time I’ve seen that fight for a long period of time in us, so I’m happy about that,” Shelton said. “But I expect that out of them. We have a senior loaded team.”

The steady rain turned into an all out downpour shortly after half, but neither coach thought the elements played much of a factor in the game. Compared to what their teams have endured in the early goings of the season, Tuesday was a nice day.

“We played a tournament this weekend and there was about an inch of snow on the ground and a blizzard in Harbor Springs,” Shelton said.

In addition to the weather, the injury bug hasn’t been kind to the Dreadnaughts, according to Forrester, leaving the Dreadnaughts (4-1-3) shy three starters on Tuesday. He said he liked the way his team looked despite the adversity.

“I was telling one of my boys players after the game, you have to play the hand your dealt, and I thought they looked good out there against a good Huron side with a lot of good athletes,” Forrester said. “It was a good game.”

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Pete Cunningham covers sports for AnnArbor.com. He can be reached at petercunningham@annarbor.com. Follow him on Twitter @petcunningham.