St. Thomas Aquinas JV Boys Soccer vs. Exeter Blue Hawks 9-16-04
The Saints traveled with the Girls JV team to Exeter High School for a non-league game against the class L schools reserve team. Earlier in the week Coach Devereaux took Jason Suleski and Adam Bermingham up to play with the varsity. He sent some players with us to get them some extra playing time and help out..
Game Captains Gordon Ober and Andrew Gardner went out and won the toss to begin the game.
The Saints took the field with Adam Bermingham and Gordon Ober as strikers. Midfielders Chris Rignoli, Andrew Gardner, Jamie Phontharaska and Brian Sullivan. Jon Campolo at stopper, Max Olsen and Tyler Joosten as fullbacks on defense. Gabe Perreault at sweeper and Collin McBride in his now familiar spot as keeper.
St. Thomas took control of the game right off the start. The players were talking and passing well. It appeared they might just roll over Exeter. Unfortunately the Blue Hawks were not ready to give up quickly. Their defense kept thwarting the Saints attacks. Most of the play was in the Exeter half though as the St. Thomas defense controlled the midfield line.
10 minutes after the start Faisal Gurwala and Pat O'Brien went in at Strikers. A few minutes later Tom Carroll, Richard Howard, Andy Stone and Kevin Schneider went in as midfielders. Bryan Collins and Justin Guilbert went in at Fullback and Matt Roginski went in at Stopper for St. Thomas.
The Saints continued to control the field and pound shots on the Blue Hawks goal. At 21:50 into the game, Carroll sent a lead pass to Gurwala who rocketed the shot over the up stretched hands of the Exeter Keeper and just under the cross bar to put St. Thomas up 1-0.
St. Thomas continued to press on their attack. The whole team worked well moving the ball and getting off shots, but no one could get one by the Exeter Keeper.
With just over Five minutes left in the half, the Blue Hawks broke through the Saints defense. McBride came out over the 18 yard line to clear out the ball. His kick bounced off the charging Exeter player and rebounded back into his body knocking the wind out of him. He was then knocked down as the Exeter attacker ran through him to put the ball in the net and tie the score.
As the trainers attended to McBride, Adam Bermingham took over in goal.
Halftime came with score tied 1-1. The Saints had out shot the Blue Hawks 14-2.
In the second half St. Thomas kicked off with Gurwala and O'Brien at Striker. Carroll, Stone, Howard, and Schneider at Midfield and Roginski, Gilbert, Collins and Perreault on defense.
Just over nine minutes into the half Exeter was awarded a direct free kick after a foul by the saints. The chip shot arced over the players and took a funny bounce that Bermingham couldn't get his hand on before a Blue Hawk kicked it into the net to put Exeter up 2-1
For the remaining 30 minutes of the game St. Thomas poured on the pressure as they worked to tie up the score.
Roginski switched from stopper to midfield with Stone to try and get hard shot on net. Howard and Guilbert swapped between midfield and fullback. McBride even played at Striker after he felt recovered.
During the final 10 minutes of the game Pat O'Brien took over as keeper to bring Bermingham out to play striker.
During the final two minutes St. Thomas really put pressure on the Exeter defense. They took 4 corner kicks and kept on pressing the attack. All eleven Blue Hawks were inside the penalty area working to hang on to their lead. A number of Saints shots were blocked by defenders and didn't even reach the keeper.
The Saints out shot the Blue Hawks 26-9 and controlled most of the game, but Lady Luck was on the Exeter bench this afternoon.
The game ended with Exeter 2 and St. Thomas 1. This was the Saints first defeat on the score board, but certainly didn't look like a loss from the field.
The Saints plays host to Oyster River on Friday.