CUMBERLAND — On an ugly, rainy night in South Cumberland, top-ranked Fort Hill mucked it up to win its ninth game in a row.
Fort Hill muscled three of its five goals across the line off set pieces, and Jaiden Dillon scored twice in a 5-2 victory over No. 4 Frankfort on Tuesday at Greenway Avenue Stadium.
“It’s really hard to play when it’s consistently raining and wet, but honestly, I thought the boys looked really good,” Fort Hill head coach Zach Steckman said.
“Everyone’s making a huge deal about being No. 1. … Our mentality hasn’t changed. We were still playing with a chip on our shoulder, and I feel like we played well tonight again.”
Fort Hill upped its record to 10-2 after beating its fourth team ranked within the Area Top 5 in its last five games. The Sentinels have beaten then No. 1 Allegany, then-No. 2 Calvary, then-No. 4 Mountain Ridge and Frankfort over that span.
Frankfort, trailing 2-1 at the half, equalized when Jake Getz scored off a Liam Orndorff assist with 37:02 remaining, but the Sentinels exploded for three goals over the next 10 minutes to pull away.
Frankfort dropped to 10-3-3, its third loss in four games following an unbeaten start through its first 12 games.
“I thought going in, if we come out with two goals, I thought that’s a tie, maybe that’s a win,” Frankfort head coach Jason Vaughan said. “I never expected us to give up that many goals in front of our own box.
“It was something we knew was coming. It’s something we practiced, something we worked on, but you still have to execute it on the field. And we didn’t. We just let too many chances in front of goal.”
Fort Hill has now scored seven set-piece goals in its last two games dating back to a 4-3 overtime win over Allegany in Homecoming last Thursday.
The Sentinels took the lead for good on a Liam Hamilton long throw-in that found Korbin McKenzie for a score with 34:28 to play.
Hunter Raines then sliced a corner kick off a Frankfort defender and into the goal with 26:05 to go for a 4-2 lead.
Dillon capped the scoring after John Reinhardt found him on a through ball, and Dillon slid a shot inside the right post with 25:19 on the clock.
Dillon gave Fort Hill its 2-1 halftime lead off a long throw-in by Hamilton with 11:13 left.
Hamilton also assisted on the game’s first score when his cross connected with Sam Spencer for a header goal 5:45 into the action.
Noah Weaver tallied Frankfort’s first-half goal when the Fort Hill keeper made a pass right to him on an attempted clearance. Weaver slotted a shot to the right side of the net with 31:55 on the clock.
Fort Hill finished with more shots (26-8), shots on goal (15-4) and corner kicks (6-1).
Frankfort keeper Alyn Weaver had 10 saves, including a diving stop on a rocket by Hamilton that seemed destined for a goal in the first half. Fort Hill goalie Bobby Brauer had two.
Frankfort is at Hampshire (6-9) on Thursday at 7:30 p.m.
Fort Hill (3-2 Western Maryland Athletic Conference) hosts Southern (3-6, 0-4 WestMAC) on Wednesday, Oct. 15, at 7 p.m.
“We beat the teams in front of us,” Steckman said. “If you look at last week’s area poll, we were four and we beat the three teams in front of us.
“Confidence is definitely sky high and that comes with winning. When you win, you get more confident. You get a little more swag to you. We’re definitely feeling good.”