Kyle Rothwell provided the spark that his Parkland High School boys soccer team needed. The junior midfielder found the back of the net three times in leading the Trojans to a bounce-back 5-1 victory over Central Catholic last Monday night in an Eastern Pennsylvania Conference game at Parkland High School.

The win evened the Trojans’ record to 1-1 after being blanked 1-0 by the Vikings in their season opener last Friday.

“The first game against them we played very selfish as a team,” said Parkland head coach Patrick Birns. “Each player wanted to get their own touches on the ball and it slowed our game down. Game two was much better, as a result we got everyone in and scored some nice goals.

“The boys played much, much quicker and less selfish. Our pace in the game was the difference. Central did not have the numbers to keep up with that pace for 80 minutes.”

It was just the second game of the shortened 2020 season for Parkland, which will play each team in its East Penn Conference division twice. Divisions were drawn along county lines for this fall, putting the Trojans in with the Vikings, Whitehall, Allen, Dieruff and Emmaus. In an odd year with little time to prepare as a team in the preseason, Birns is pleased with his team through the first two games of the campaign.

“It has been a crazy start to the season, but the boys have been very resilient,” Birns said. “The energy in training and in the two games have been very inconsistent. Only time will tell if we can become more of a consistent team.”

The Trojans were shutout in their opener three days prior, but jumped out of the gate on their home turf. Three different players scored goals in the first half, including Rothwell, Joel Santiago and Zack Morales, and Parkland took a 3-1 lead into halftime.

Central, which threatened for a majority of the game, was unable to score more than one goal, thanks to the combined efforts in goal of Matthew Link and Victor Baran, who combined for five saves. Link started and played all of the first half, while Baran closed the game out in the second half.

Rothwell tacked on his second and third goals in the second half. Santiago and Morales recorded an assist each.

“We talked about not winning balls in the box on Friday,” said Birns. “Kyle scored all three of his goals by winning the ball in the box on Monday.”