Boys Soccer: A Royal day for Rogers in first game on Warrior turf

Rogers 9, Brainerd 1

The key: The Royals outshot Brainerd 13-5

Overall: Brd 0-1-0

Next: Brainerd at Sartell 5 p.m. Tuesday.

A 9-1 loss to the Rogers Royals on Friday wasn't the way the Brainerd Warriors wanted to christen the first official sporting event on the new artificial turf at Adamson Field.

But with a young team (just six seniors in uniform) the Warriors are going to learn on the fly until they gain the experience and confidence to become competitive.

Rogers overwhelmed the Warriors with 13 shots while it restricted Brainerd to only five. The Royals tallied on two penalty kicks and had other opportunities they either kicked wide or over the cage.

In addition, Warriors' keeper Joe Anderholm stopped some point-blank shots.

"It does put a lot of pressure on some of our younger kids to hold their weight when we're going up against teams that are faster, stronger, bigger," Warriors coach Tony Smith said, "and we just tactically, and as a team, have got to do better and work a little better together.

"We tried to find the little things we could be encouraged about. There were moments that I thought was good play, a ball through the midfield, good possession. It just seems like we were disconnected today. We just haven't really melded as a team yet."

Senior defender Taylor Schloemer said it was great to play on turf but the Warriors need to gain game experience.

"It was great to play on this synthetic surface," Schloemer said. "Now just we just need to learn how to play on it, and improve our game from here.

"We need to learn how to jell. We had some issues on the back line today. We have to do better."

Trevor Klink and Mitch Steeves each had hat tricks for the Royals, who jumped on Brainerd with five first-half goals, two on penalty kicks.

Klink opened the scoring at 2:11 of the first. Anderholm came out to make a stop at the top of the goal box but the ball squirted loose and Klink banged it home.

Steeves put Rogers in front 2-0 by converting a penalty kick at 22:55.

Then the scoring barrage commenced.

AJ Wedell deflected in a corner kick at 31:15, Steeves scored on another penalty kick 30 seconds later. Klink gave Rogers a 5-0 lead with just over five minutes until the half.

Corey Tollefsrud then became the answer to a trivia question: Who scored the first Warrior goal on turf?) when he tallied on a long floater over Rogers' keeper Joe Schlottman at 47:49.

Klink completed his hat trick at 53:11. In the final 15 minutes, Logan Olkon, Steeves for his hat trick and Matt Carik added goals for the Royals.

"I don't know what their roster grade-level breakdown is but you can tell they're a good team," Smith said of Rogers. "They pass well, they understand each other's spacing and position. Those are the teams that are going to give us trouble this year.

"But it's water off my back. We're going to start fresh (Saturday). We'll tackle it. Short-term memory will be a big key this year. We can be disappointed, and we should be disappointed, but I'm going to keep my head up and hopefully the boys will keep their heads up too."

Rogers 5 4 - 9

Brainerd 0 1 - 1

First half: R-Trevor Klink 2:11; R-Mitch Steeves PK 22:55; R-AJ Wedell (Steves) 31:15; R-Steves PK 31:45; R-Klink 34:58

Second half: Brd-Corey Tollefsrud (Isaiah Gilderman) 47:49; R-Klink 53:11; R-Logan Olkon 65:48; R-Steeves 69:44; R-Matt Carik 76:42

Shots on goal: R 13, B 5

Goalkeepers: R-Joe Schlottman (4 saves); B-Joe Anderholm (4 saves)