One Knox SC Gets Back to Winning Ways at Home

USL LEAGUE ONE MATCHDAY 11	1ST HALF	2ND HALF	FINAL
GREENVILLE TRIUMPH SC (2-5-1 | 7 PTS)	0	0	0
ONE KNOXVILLE SC (6-2-3 | 21 PTS)	0	2	2

KNOXVILLE, Tenn. – Having gone nearly a month without a victory and even longer without one in front of its own fans, One Knoxville SC made it a point to ensure that empty feeling wouldn’t linger any longer. The squad turned in a dominant performance on Friday night to the tune of 2-0 win over Greenville Triumph SC, making the Covenant Health Park crowd even happier for a match touted as Knoxville’s Biggest Happy Hour.

“We needed full buy-in and we got that tonight,” Head Coach Ian Fuller said. “We have high standards here and the fact that we hadn’t one for a bit, I really challenged the players this week to see if we can get a better performance out of them and I thought this was the most complete performance that we’ve had all season.”

The win sees One Knox push its points total up to 21 as it sits in second place in the USL League One table.

After a first half that saw a lot of chances, but no goals to show for it, One Knox flipped the script in the final 45 minutes with Will Perkins sending in a cross that contributed to an own goal, while Braudilio Rodrigues capped the night off with a stunning curler to seal the victory in the 81st minute.

Meanwhile Johan Garibay turned in a two-save performance en route to his fifth clean sheet of the season.

“It’s a great three points for us,” Rodrigues said. “We really needed this win. We had played good in the other matches but just wasn’t getting the results. We talked about having more commitment and running in transition and tonight we did that.”

For Rodrigues, it was his second straight match finding the back of the net and his fifth goal across all competitions. And this latest one may be the best from the Lexington SC-loanee.

Receiving a diagonal ball from Abel Caputo, Rodrigues took a couple of touches to cut in from the left corner of the box before whipping a right-footed strike that bent just into the far post, leaving Greenville goalkeeper Amal Knight completely frozen.

“That’s been my spot since I’ve been born,” Rodrigues laughed. “So when I got it there, I knew it was in. I wish I would’ve watched it longer, because I knew it was going in once I hit it, so I just started it running. I wish I can go back and enjoy it for a split second more. I’ll watch the replays and take it in.”

It was the perfect way to cap off a Man of the Match outing for the Portuguese forward who also completed all 24 of his passes and led the team with three fouls drawn.

“You see his quality and you see it in other areas of the pitch as well,” Fuller noted of Rodrigues. “For him to score that way, I’m so thrilled for him.”

With Rodrigues leading the charge, One Knoxville SC found itself on the front foot for much of the evening with nearly 60% of the possession and had led the way with 55 entries into the final third.

The squad was finally able to break through three minutes into the second half with Perkins finding space to drive towards the right corner flag following a nice sequence of passing. With three runners in the box, the One Knox defender tried to pick out one but his cross deflected off the head of Greenville’s Patrick Seagrist, shot up into the air before somehow just barely finding a home inside the far corner of the goal.

“As I crossed it and it him, I just figured it was going to go out for a goal kick, so I started getting back on defense,” Perkins recalled. “Next thing you know, it’s in the top corner and I’m running to celebrate.”

It was the second consecutive match that One Knox was the beneficiary of an own goal after notching one in the dying moments of its 2-2 draw last week at Corpus Christi FC.

The one on Saturday though felt more deserved in Fuller’s eyes and allowed his squad to find more space in the attack afterwards, eventually leading to a second goal.

“We knew that the first goal was going to be huge with them playing five in the back,” he explained. “Sometimes you need a break and we got a massive break there.”

NEXT UP
With the win in hand, One Knoxville SC will get a bit of a break before returning to Covenant Health Park for a pair of matches. The squad will host Chattanooga Red Wolves SC on June 10 (tickets) for its third match in the Prinx Tires USL Cup before jumping back into USL1 play against the New York Cosmos on June 13 (tickets).