Catawba Ridge’s Caden Tull, left, battles for the ball against a Greenville player during their match Saturday afternoon.

The Catawba Ridge boys’ soccer team wasted no time in going to work Saturday beating the Greenville Red Raiders 7-1 In the third round of the 4A Upper State playoffs. 

The Copperheads will now host Eastside at home Monday in the 4A Upper State championship. Eastside ended Catawba Ridge’s run last year in the Upper State championship at their place and the Copperheads want to make sure history doesn’t repeat itself. Catawba Ridge is now 20-2 overall on the season.

“We want Eastside,” said Catawba Ridge head coach Phillip McCarter. “They are a state championship quality team. You know it’s gonna be a battle. They have some world class players.”

Catawba Ridge took the attack to Greenville in the early going Saturday afternoon as they had early shots within the first several minutes of play. The Copperheads got on the board six minutes into the game as Derek Ringnalda scored to put the home team on the board. 

Catawba Ridge did well controlling possession in the first half and continued to get shot in goals off corner kicks. 

Caden Tull extended the Copperheads’ lead with his first goal of the game at the 13th minute and then came back 20 minutes later to score off a corner kick. 

The game got chippy between the refs and Greenville fans as one fan was removed early on from the game. Greenville did convert a penalty kick towards the end of the first half, but had an offsides penalty which scratched the goal. 

“We had a slow start in the last game and we knew we couldn’t let that happen again,” McCarter said. “We knew we were gonna have to play 80 minutes.”

Catawba Ridge came out in the second half just as strong. Tull got the hat trick scoring in the 51st minute to find the Copperheads with a comfortable lead. 

Greenville was able to prevent the shutout with about 21 minutes left in the game getting their only goal.

Catawba Ridge wasn’t done with the scoring as Joshua White struck twice in the final 11 minutes to extend their lead and then Andew Dong finished things off for the Copperheads scoring with 4:30 left in the game as well.

In other games…

The Copperheads baseball team won 9-3 beating Westside to stay alive in the playoffs. They now will travel to Laurens Monday needing to win two games to claim the District title. Grayson Wild went four innings allowing three hits and two runs on the mound. Jake McCoy, Jackson Mullen and Lane Boutwell all had two hits in the game. Mullen had three RBI and Boutwell had two RBI. The Copperheads are now 22-7 on the season.

The Catawba Ridge girls’ soccer team fell to Eastside on the road Saturday as well losing 2-1 in the third round of the 4A playoffs. The Copperheads finish their season at 16-4 overall.

Mac Banks: mac@fortmillprepsports.com, @fortprep

Catawba Ridge’s Joshua White goes to kick the ball before the Greenville keeper runs interference.