If last week was a step in the right direction, Saturday may have been affirmation.
Coming off their first win of the season last week in Phoenix, the Pittsburgh Riverhounds were dominant against Detroit City, the last unblemished team in the USL Championship.
Pat Hogan and Danny Griffin scored in the first half in a 2-0 win at Highmark Stadium.
After going winless in their first five games, the Hounds (2-3-2) seem to be finding their footing.
“I saw progression in Phoenix and it’s nice to see progression again,” Hounds coach Bob Lilley said. “Hopefully next week we can be a little more clinical with the good moments that we’re creating. I know in May it’s hard to gauge everything, but Detroit’s off to a good start, winning their first five and even came back in a few of those. We gave up some chances in the second half, but we weren’t ever under enormous pressure. I felt like we were more likely to score the next goal than them.”
A Highmark Stadium regular-season record crowd of 6,002 got to see the Hounds’ first home goal of the season when Hogan converted a header following a corner kick in the 20th minute.
At 6-foot-4, Hogan is the tallest outfield player for the Hounds, and he used his size to score his first as a Hound in his second season with the club.
Kenardo Forbes put a corner in and the ball bounced from one end of the 18-yard box to the other before settling for Robbie Mertz on the right side.
Mertz flicked a cross into Hogan, who shook his defender.
“In that situation, you almost have to recycle your run and get away from the defender,” Hogan said. “Sometimes people will ball watch and you can slip in behind them. I was actually shocked I was that free. When Robbie turned, I knew he was going to cut back to his right, so I bee-lined for the front middle and luckily no one followed me. I was able to get a free header.”
In the 35th minute, Junior Etou made an aggressive and successful run toward goal and was tripped in the box by a sliding Devon Amoo-Mensah resulting in a penalty.
Amoo-Menash received a yellow card for the foul.
Hounds captain Danny Griffin took the penalty and slipped it past Detroit keeper Nate Steinwascher at the left post.
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Steinwascher guessed correctly in his dive and got a hand on the ball, but not enough to keep it from going past the goal line.
After it was 2-0, the Hounds did a pretty good job playing with the lead.
Detroit (5-1) only produced one moment that threatened goal in the second half, when Maxi Rodriguez put a header on target, but Hounds keeper Eric Dick was there to stop it.
Dick earned his third clean sheet of the season.
Kenardo Forbes added another milestone to the list Saturday when he became the all-time leader in minutes played in the USL Championship during the 55th minute. He’s logged over 2,138 minutes in his career.
The Hounds were without forward Edward Kizza, who was left off the team sheet due to knee soreness. Lilley said he’s hopeful Kizza will be available again soon, possibly next Saturday when they host Miami FC.
After starting the season with three consecutive losses, the Hounds will look to make it three wins in a row next week.
“It was definitely nice to reaffirm that we can still compete even if we had a rough start,” Hogan said. “We started slow, but it’s not how you start, it’s how you finish. As we progress, I think we can build on these wins and keep the momentum going. Last year we didn’t start great, but in the middle part of the season, we took off. If we can do that again, we’ll be fine towards the end of the year.”