IN POSSESSION — Oak Glen’s Mandy Wilson stops the ball while Weir High’s Kameryn Mallas pursues during Thursday’s match at the Bears Den. - Andrew Grimm

Thursday evening’s first meeting of the season between Hancock County rivals at the Bears Den was no exception.

After playing scoreless for nearly the entire first half, the teams, who have had several classic battles over the years, traded goals less than a minute apart just before halftime.

Despite several close calls in the second half, those ended up being the only two goals as the rivals battled to a 1-1 draw.

“Anytime we play Weir, it’s going to be a battle,” Oak Glen head coach Bill Watts said. “I’ve been around the program for 10 years and it hasn’t mattered if one of us is having a good year, a down year, if we’re both having good years — it’s always going to be a tight game. The girls on both sides are going to give their best effort in this game playing against their local rivals.

Weir High celebrates Kylie Dunmyer’s goal against Oak Glen. - Andrew Grimm

“I thought we did some good things, we’re still young and getting better. We made a couple mistakes, but we’re improving.”

After more than 30 minutes of scoreless soccer, Weir High (2-3-1) struck first when Kylie Dunmyer connected with 9:04 to go in the half.

The celebration was short lived, though, as just 47 seconds later Oak Glen (1-4-2) charged the other way and the Bears’ Ashtyn Tharp finished a nice passing play to knot the score up.

In the second half, each team had chances to score a potential game-winner, but the bulk of those chances went the way of the Red Riders.

Two of the best were a Dunmyer shot that rung the goal post nine minutes into the second half, then another prime scoring opportunity that was denied by a diving save from Oak Glen keeper Giada Giambroni with 12 minutes to play, perhaps her best of seven saves in the game.

Oak Glen’s Ashtyn Tharp controls the ball against Weir High. - Andrew Grimm

“She’s a senior and she’s done a really good job,” Watts said of his keeper.

Several other good looks went high, wide, were blocked by a defender or went right to Giambroni.

“You hate to tie when it feels like you dominated and had the majority of the chances, but it happens sometimes,” Weir head coach Jeremy Angelo said. “There are times where you’re on the other side of it and happy to tie.

“We had a lot of chances, we did everything but score and that comes down to finishing the play off. We get the ball, we take shots and no one is there to follow up.

“We’re battling, that’s about all we can do right now.”

At the other end, Weir’s Bella Weber made the saves she needed to to keep the Golden Bears at bay.

Oak Glen had a prime chance to steal the victory in the final 30 seconds when they had a corner kick, but a shot sailed high and wide of the net leaving the game to end in a deadlock.

“This is always a close game, we tell (the players) coming in it’s going to be a close battle and we have to finish when we have opportunities,” Angelo said. “We had two or three good opportunities in each half and didn’t take advantage. If we finsh a couple of those it could have been a different game.

“We’ll move on and try to get a win on Saturday.”

UP NEXT

Weir High: Returns home to host Winfield on Saturday.

Oak Glen: Travels to Indian Creek on Tuesday.