On paper it did not appear that the Friday September 25 match between the undefeated Cranford High School soccer team and winless Union Catholic would be very competitive but the cliché that games are not won on paper proved to almost trip up the Cougars. Trailing 1-0 at the half, Cranford rallied with two second half goals, the final coming in the game’s final ten seconds to move to 7-0 with a 2-1 victory at Walnut Avenue Field. Nick Pace, who earlier assisted on a goal by Alex Rocha to tie the game, scored the game-winning goal off a throw-in from Alex Porter with seven seconds left to win the game.
The victory completed another undefeated week for Coach Mike Curci’s team, which earlier featured shutout victories against Rahway, 3-0 on Tuesday Sept. 22 and Roselle Catholic 4-0 on Thursday Sept 24. Curci would not use the third game in four days as an excuse for the Union Catholic (UC) scare.
“I wouldn't say back-to-back was the issue. UC is a better team than their record. They came out fired up and basically every team is after us, so that means we always need to be focused. They spread the field out nicely in the first half, but we also missed a wide open net minutes before they scored. If we put that in, it would have taken them down a notch,” said Curci.
Instead Union Catholic gave the Cougars their first halftime deficit of the year, prompting Curci to make some halftime adjustments, even though he sensed no panic from his confident team.
“The boys were confident they were the better team and would get the job done. No ranting or raving, just confidence. That was good enough for me. I moved (Eric) Walano from stopper to midfield to work with the speedy Pace and they took control of the midfield. I moved Ray El-Khoury back to stopper because his back was sore and he would have less running around. He and (Pat) Kaskiw did a great job and UC really never had a decent scoring chance in the second half,” said Curci.
Rocha broke the ice with a low right-footed shot from eight yards out five minutes into the second half off a feed from Pace, who sent the ball on the ground to the center of the goal mouth.
“Nick played an outstanding game. He was all over the place and made sure he was the right spot with time running out. His hustle allowed that to happen."
With time running down under 20 seconds, Cranford had no time to get its normal long thrower Ryan Lopes into position, so Curci yelled for the closest player, Porter, to take the throw which found Pace alone in front of the goal for a header. Cranford has been deadly off restarts, which include throwins and free kicks.
“Set pieces are a big part of our game. We've scored at least four times off long throws into the box and off of numerous corners this year. We're not a team that is going to come in and blow people away. We first look to play outstanding defense, and then manufacture a few goals. That's what has made us successful." said Curci.
One of the Cougar’s weapons has been Lopes’ long throw ins. “Basically, the long throws become additional corners and anytime you get the ball into the goal mouth, anything can happen. Ryan has been outstanding in that area, even on big fields and we've been making smart runs into the box,” said Curci.
The Cougars are now 3-0 in the newly formed Union County Conference and has outscored its opponents 25-3, with four shutouts and has not given up more than one goal per game. Goalie Scott Boyer now has 44 career wins.
They finished out September with a home game against Roselle on Tuesday, September 29 and christened October with a home game against. Rumson on Thursday, October 1. In between on Wednesday night was the Union County Tournament seeding meeting, where the Cougars were hoping for a number one seed.
The Cougars also had their hands full the day before on Roselle Catholic’s small grass field, but after battling through a scoreless first half they broke through on a goal by George El-Khoury, followed in rapid succession by goals from Ray El-Khoury, Pat Hartnett and Walano. Boyer stopped six shots for his fourth shutout.
Two days earlier the Cougars scored twice in the first nine minutes with Connor DeMars heading in a long throw by Lopes four minutes into the game and leading scorer Pat Hartnett converting a pass from Kaskiw five minutes later. Hartnett finished the scoring in the second half when he took a feed from Walano.
The Brearley boys are also off to a fine start. On Friday they improved to 4-1 with a 2-0 home victory over Roselle Catholic. Rajbir Cheema knocked in a pass from Nicholas Almeida from 22 yards out at the 11-minute mark of the first half and assisted Dom Cullari, who scored in the second half. Goalie Jeff Domingos had five saves for the Bears, who outshot the Lions 15-7.
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