LEXINGTON — Not even the surprise storm that rolled through the area could dampen Madison’s coronation ceremony.
Joey Walker scored an unassisted goal in the 76th minute as the Rams completed a perfect run through the Ohio Cardinal Conference with a 1-0 win at Lexington on Tuesday.
Madison (12-1-0, 6-0-0) already had clinched the league title by virtue of the OCC’s scoring system.
A conference win is worth three points and a tie is worth one point, meaning the Rams already had accumulated 15 points before the start of Tuesday’s match. Lex (5-5-2, 3-1-2) had 11 points coming in, so even a win over the Rams would have given the Minutemen just 14 points.
“We came into this game, because we knew we (already) won the conference, a little slow. We weren’t aggressive,” Walker said as rain blew in sideways and fans scrambled for cover.
“We knew this was Lex’s championship game because if they beat us they could still say, ‘We beat Madison.’ We knew we had to take care of business and we came out here and we did.”
Madison won its first conference title since 2011. Lexington was the defending OCC champ and had won or shared four of the past six OCC titles.
“It was a great way to end it, but I can’t say that we deserved it,” Madison coach Tim Lord said. “Lexington outplayed us but we were able to sneak one in there at the end.
“When you are doing well things go your way a little bit.”
Tuesday’s match could be a postseason preview. Both Madison and Lexington will compete in the Division III Norwalk district. The tournament draw is Sunday.
“It proves that we are capable of doing things. We’ve just got to figure out how to finish now,” Lexington coach Peter Them said. “The fun part about this is hopefully we can do this again in a few weeks.
“That district is going to be a heck of a fight.”