photo by: John Young

Free State High senior Heitor Nazareth (11) jumps up to play the ball in front of Shawnee Mission North freshman John Joe Lopez during their match Thursday evening at FSHS.

Free State High senior forward Heitor Nazareth found the back of the net three times, aiding his boys soccer team to a 4-1 victory over Shawnee Mission North at home on Thursday.

But it was the lone goal he didn’t score that Nazareth was most proud of.

With four minutes to go in the first half, Nazareth lofted the ball from the left corner up around the front of the goal. Junior defender Charlie Newsome then leapt up and took advantage of a perfect pass with a header into the net.

The play by the prolific pair gave the Firebirds a 2-0 lead, which they would take into the intermission.

“I’m most proud with the assist than the goals,” Nazareth said. “Because we have been practicing that play, I’m really happy because of that.”

For much of the first half, Free State (4-3) dominated the possession and took twice as many shot attempts as Shawnee Mission North. The Indians were the aggressive ones early, however, taking a consecutive attempts in the seventh minute, that were saved by Firebirds’ senior goalkeeper Jonathan Lesslie.

After a couple early saves, Free State switched to attack mode. In the 17th minute, Nazareth broke free down the field, where senior Branden Patterson nailed him with a dime.

Nazareth only had to make the the Indians goalkeeper miss, notching his first goal on the night.

“He wanted to try and finish,” Free State coach Kelly Barah said. “Yesterday at practice you could see he was down on himself. He really wanted to execute for his team. It’s nice to see a kid put in the work and have it translate onto the field.”

Nazareth had a pair of breakaways later in the first half that he ultimately missed wide right. Both times he paused and looked down toward the ground, frustrated with himself for not finishing.

But rather than let his misfires haunt him for the rest of the evening, Nazareth took advice from his teammates at the intermission.

“In the first half, I missed those two and I was kind of frustrated,” Nazareth said. “But I talked to my teammates and they told me not to think about it and put it in. I was just like I have to finish this game early, so they gave me motivation to finish.”

Nazareth came out firing early, netting his second goal within the first two minutes of the second half. Nazareth had his ball deflected by the Indians goalkeeper, before it ricocheted off the left post and bounced in, giving the Firebirds a 3-0 advantage.

With a little over 29 minutes left in the game, Nazareth sealed his third and final goal of the night from the left side. To put that in comparison, he had three goals combined through the first five games of the season.

“It’s nice to see the kids weren’t just going to sit back and hope the other team was going to make mistakes,” Barah said. “We should still try and go after the game.”

Nazareth would exit the game a minute later for good and the remaining starters would soon follow. Shawnee Mission North got on the board with a goal by sophomore forward Sergio Barajas with 17:25 left to play.

Unlike the first half, the Indians dominated much of the possession in the second half. As a result, the Firebirds left a lot to be desired on the defensive end.

“We made some uncharacteristic mistakes but it was a solid performance,” Barah said. “We always want to keep a clean sheet, which we didn’t do today. So tomorrow we will work on some defensive stuff.”

Free State will travel to Topeka at 12 p.m. Saturday.