LEXINGTON — It was as symbolic as it gets for the annual Lexington-Ontario rivalry boys soccer match.
The high-emotion contest may have ended in a 3-3 tie, but it wasn’t without its headlines. Ontario came off of a 9-0 loss to Ashland in Game 1 of the season on Aug. 14 while Lexington was making the season debut for 2026 after having Game 1 postponed due to wet field conditions.
And in a cross county rivalry games, emotions ran hot and yellow cards went flying fast and furious, but the outcome ended up being one of the most exciting ties in recent memory. And it capped off Lexington-Ontario week with the Warriors owning a 3-0-1 advantage in the volleyball, football and boys and girls soccer meetings played in less than a week.
“There were some haymakers on the soccer field in the verbal sense and it was just a good battle for our first game,” Lexington coach Peter Them said. “We beat ourselves on a couple of mistakes where we were just knocking off the rust in our first opportunity to get back on the field. It’s Game 1 and we learned a lot about ourselves. I am extremely proud of the way the guys fought the whole game.”
Ontario took a 1-0 lead when Henry Yugovich finished off a free kick from the corner by Ian Morrison with a beautiful header. Morrison added a second goal off of a corner that connected with the head of a Lexington player and skipped back into the goal to make it 2-0 Ontario with 16:15 left in the first half. Lexington cut the lead in half on a Gabe McFadden penalty kick to send the game to a 2-1 score at the half.
Ian Morrison added his second goal of the night when he sent the ball into the mixer that pinged off of a Lexington defender and into the back of the net for a 3-1 lead, but the Minutemen weren’t ready to throw in the towel. Dom Schroeder headed in his first goal of the season to make it 3-2 with 11:44 left in the game before Cam Turlo popped a shot off of an Ontario defender and in to knot the game up at three apiece with 1:12 left and the score stuck.
“It was disappointing to give them two goals that they didn’t earn,” Them said. “But the effort in the last 25 minutes where we stuck to the game plan even when they were dumping everything deep. We just need to clean it up and do what we do and go from there.”
After a devastating loss in Game 1, Ontario coach Steve Armstrong was proud of the response by his guys.
“We talked all week about what we didn’t see against Ashland that we needed to see in this game and it was a lot of stuff,” Armstrong said. “It was pretty much everything, but our reality was, we had to focus on our intensity, our pressure on the ball, our first touch and staying together as a unit. We can’t let something like a 9-0 game tear us apart especially in Game 1 of the season and I wanted to see how the boys recovered. I am super proud. Sure, we were up 3-1, but this is a win for us. It’s a turnaround that we are looking for.”
He was especially proud of Morrison, who had a hand in all three goals scored in the match.
“We have been talking to Ian a lot about his mental game,” Armstrong said. “Last year, he was a solid technical player for us, but played with his head down sometimes and was really hard on himself when he thought he made mistakes. He took himself out of the game mentally, but he has really made strides in that aspect during the offseason and we are seeing tremendous growth.”
Ontario (0-1-1) continues a tough nonconference slate with a road game at Upper Sandusky on Aug. 27. The Warriors hope the draw against Lexington is a momentum builder.
“We have a tough first four games with Ashland, Lexington, Upper Sandusky and Mount Vernon and the last thing we wanted was to start 0-4,” Armstrong said. “Even though we didn’t pull off a win here, this is a moral victory. We knew it was going to be a tough environment to play in as an Ontario-Lex rivalry game always is with shadow games and mind games and that type of stuff. We told the boys that Gavin (Wagner) is the only one who can talk to the officials and no one else no matter what happens. We executed and communicated and were ready to play.”
Lexington (0-0-1) travels to Wooster on Aug. 25 where the Minutemen hope to finally settle into the season after a long layoff between the final preseason scrimmage to the start of the regular season.
“We haven’t played for two weeks since our last scrimmage, so it was nice to finally get started,” Them said. “Everyone else has had 2-3 opportunities to get on the field. We turn around and have to get after it right away. We will take this result and move on.”
This article originally appeared on Mansfield News Journal: Lexington, Ontario draw in boys soccer to cap off epic rivalry week
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