Myers Park, learning as it goes, rolls past West Cabarrus in NCHSAA soccer playoffs

Nineteen games into the 2024 soccer season, Myers Park High School is still unbeaten and chasing a state championship.

The Mustangs routed West Cabarrus 7-1 Saturday in the first round of the N.C. High School Athletic Association state playoffs.

“I feel really good about this group of guys,” said Myers Park coach Bucky McCarley, 48, who is in his 23rd season. “I don’t know where that’s going to lead. I’ve stopped altogether trying to anticipate what their ceiling might be or how far they can go.”

McCarley said his team is senior-heavy and driven, mainly by the memories of a 2023 season when the Mustangs finished 10-2-7 overall, earning third place in the SoMECK conference and losing 3-2 to Northwest Guilford in the first round of the state playoffs.

“We all knew we underperformed last year,” McCarley said. “People said Myers Park had a down year. We didn’t have a down year. We had tied a surprising number of games and one of the reasons was we struggled to finish. I feel like one of the reasons why this team is so cool, calm and collected is they learned from the scars and frustrations we experienced last year; not having played as well, not having committed to practice as much as we should. This group of seniors won’t let that happen again.”

McCarley and Myers Park (17-0-2) won their 10th straight game Saturday and will host Hickory Ridge (14-5-2) in a second-round game Tuesday night.

Hickory Ridge, which tied Myers Park 2-2 in August, beat Weddington 3-0 in its first-round match.

The Ragin’ Bulls, however, have not been in great form recently. Before Saturday’s win, Hickory Ridge had gone 1-3-1 in its previous five matches.

But Hickory Ridge was a state semifinalist last season and McCarley said he knows the team is dangerous.

“We won’t be taking them lightly at all,” he said.

Myers Park, which won the NCHSAA 4A title in 2008, has been on a tear, pretty much all season.

The Mustangs have outscored opponents 98-13 and have posted nine shutouts.

Reigning Charlotte Observer athlete of the week Beni Sibu leads the Mustangs with 27 goals and eight assists. Sibu had two goals Saturday. Teammate Femi Ogunwale had two goals and two assists.

“I think we are playing well and we are winning games,” McCarley said, “but if we want to, we can be a lot better than we are right now. We got up a goal or two tonight and we were a little bit impressed with ourselves, for about 10 minutes, and they got a goal on us.”

What McCarley said he did like was after that West Cabarrus score, Myers Park put on an offensive flurry that ended the game — and got back into form.

“If we can keep learning while we’re winning, we’re in a really, really good place. And I feel like with all the results we’ve stacked up, they keep learning while we’re having success and that’s not an easy thing for teenage boys to do,” he said. “It’s so easy to read your press clippings and be impressed with yourself. But they’re not satisfied with what they just finished doing.”

▪ Note: For Myers Park, Andre Adams, Nelson Waple, Ollie Badir, Beni Sibu (2), Femi Ogunwale (2) all scored. Assists went to Waple, Henry Boner, Femi (2), Gavin Trosch, and Connor Greene.