NTL BOYS SOCCER: ATHENS ROLLS PAST TROY, 6-1 (October 10, 2026)

Valley Sports Report
EAST TROY — Athens built a 3-0 lead midway through the second half, then put the game away with three late goals in a 6-1 win over Troy here Saturday in NTL boys soccer action.

Athens coach Travis Reynard has set a high bar for his program, and was not pleased with his team's performance.

"Regardless of the score, it simply wasn’t good enough all around," he said. "There were flashes of great plays, but also many moments of poor decision-making, laziness and lack of communication. 

"As we head into crucial games, it has to be better and the boys know that," added Reynard. "It’s on them to execute the plan put in place to the best of their ability for the full a 80 minutes."

The Wildcats had five different goal-scorers, with junior Riley Patterson the only player to score two goals.

Senior Kamdyn Wheeler, juniors Ben Krissler and Patrick Umber and freshman Bryce Gombocz also netted goals for the Wildcats.

Umber recorded two assists, while Wheeler and senior Zach Blackman each had one.

"When you have roughly 34 shots total, only put 14 on-target and score six, that is not an efficient day," said Reynard. "We have to be smarter in the final third and be OK with moving the ball around to create easy chances rather than just wasting opportunities on wild shots."

Wheeler, off a feed from Umber, scored about six minutes into the game to give the Wildcats a 1-0 lead.

Krissler, off Umber's second assist, scored midway through the half to up the Athens lead to 2-0, which is where it stood at the half.

Patterson, off a helper from Wheeler, gave the Wildcats a 3-0 lead with 24:56 remaining in the contest.

The Trojans got on the board about 2 1/2 minutes later, but Athens finished strong.

Freshman Bryce Gombocz and Umber scored goals in a 110-second span to extend the advantage to 5-1 with 15:34 remaining in the game, and Patterson finished off the scoring with 5:30 left on the clock.

Athens had a 14-4 advantage in shots-on-goal, and a 9-1 edge in corner kicks.

Senior Zach Fisher registered three saves in net for the Wildcats.

"It’s the simple mistakes that hurt us," said Reynard. "We have conceded the last few games due to our own errors at different spots all over the field and that simply can’t happen. 

"Other than our mistake today, the team was able to win the ball back and handled the balls out of the air fairly well so I was glad to see improvement there as we have been working on that," he added.

Athens, now 10-3-2, hosts Wellsboro Tuesday.

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IN PHOTO: Athens junior Patrick Umber. ... VSR STOCK PHOTO.

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