After losing its last three meetings to Central Columbia, Lewisburg had the regular-season meeting between the two District 4 powerhouses circled on its calendar since last year. Given the opportunity to snap that losing streak in the series on Tuesday, the Green Dragons did not disappoint. 

Lewisburg delivered a comprehensive performance, outplaying Central Columbia in all facets en route to a 4-0 win at Lewisburg on Tuesday.

“For the last two years, they beat us and we’ve been wanting this one for a couple years now, and it honestly one of the best feelings,” said Lewisburg captain Viktor Permyashkin, who had a goal and an assist. 

Lewisburg entered the match 2-0 with wins over Warrior Run and Dallas, but had only scored two goals total in those two matches. On Tuesday, they didn’t create a ton of chances, but when they had chances, they made the most of them.

From start to finish, the Green Dragons appeared locked in on the task at hand. 

“We came in focused. We knew that (Central Columbia) was  kind of the team to beat with some of the results early, and we were able to kind of stay focused and play together,” Lewisburg coach Ben Kettlewell said. 

Nowhere was that more evident than when the Green Dragons were defending. Their organization, from pressing forwards to the midfield to the back line, was sensational all match. When Central Columbia was able to make its way into their attacking third, Lewisburg was suffocating, getting plenty of numbers behind the ball with great ball pressure. 

“I give credit to Gabe Pawling, our keeper, and then Riley Gulden-Luthi, our center back to kind of organize us and kind of put us in positions to do that. And then just our work ethic to go, ‘Hey, I need to always get myself back in position and kind of help out our team,'” Kettlewell said.

For the game’s first 20 minutes, the action was nip and tuck. If anything, Central Columbia was controlling play a bit more than the Green Dragons. But that all changed when Lewisburg opened the scoring. With 21:31 left in the first half, Logan Kitchens got on the end of a cross from Isaac Ayres and tapped it in to give his team the lead.

That changed the momentum of the game significantly. 

“Goals change soccer games and make teams make decisions on, adjusting some initial tactics,” Kettlewell said. 

And, when Lewisburg scored a goal off a set piece by Gulden-Luthi off of a set piece by Permyashkin that snuck through the Blue Jay defense with just over a minute to go before halftime, the momentum had fully shifted to the Green Dragons. 

Five minutes into the second half, Central Columbia had a great chance to score when Torin Karns cut in on his right foot and fired a bullet to the near post. But Pawling expertly parried it away out of trouble, just when it looked like Central Columbia was going to find its way back into the match. 

Lewisburg put the game on ice with a goal with just over 16 minutes remaining as Ethan Vinolas craftily flicked a ball into the net with his back to goal. They capped the scoring in the game’s final minute after the Blue Jays were called for an illegal back pass, granting Lewisburg and indirect free kick from just ten yards out

Viktor Permyashkin slotted it into the bottom right corner of the goal to extend the Green Dragon margin to four and ran off to the right corner flag to emphatically celebrate with his teammates.

“They were all lined up on the near post, I was like ‘that back post is open’ and I scored and all the anger and the anxiousness from the last two years of wanting to beat them blew and I was like, ‘might as well run in the corner and celebrate'” Permyashkin said.

Lewisburg 4 Central 0 

L–Logan Kitchens (Isaac Ayres), 21:31. L–Riley Gulden-Luthi (Viktor Permyashkin), 1:14. L–Ethan Vinolas (Ayres), 16:13. L–Permyashkin (Jack Johnson), 0:21.

Shots: L 7, CC 2. Saves: L 2 (Gabe Pawling), CC 3 (Gabriel Huss).