A gallery of action photos will be posted at the following link: http://photos.suburbanonesports.com/
By Alex Frazier
Central Bucks South coach Don Brady preaches to his players, “You cannot give a goal up first five of a half, last five of a half or after you score a goal.”
In their first two games, the Titans gave up just one goal while scoring five.
But Monday, Neshaminy scored just 3:31 into the game and added two more to blank the Titans 3-0.
“It’s frustrating when we don’t score,” said Brady. “We definitely had some chances.”
“It’s not a 3-0 game,” said Neshaminy coach Rich Reice. “That was an evenly played game. I was impressed with C.B. South. They have a nice team.”
The Redskins are also on a scoring roll, having netted seven goals in two starts.
“We didn’t look good in two-a-days, but the past two games we had to mind our business. We came out and produced,” said senior Ricky Domico. “Every school day soccer is on my mind. I worked hard in the off-season, went to two camps, came in prepared to help my team out.”
Neshaminy is doing it with a young squad.
After the first game against Wissahickon, Reice asked his team how many seniors had started their first varsity game.
Five raised their hands.
Then he asked how many ninth, 10th and 11th graders had just played in their first varsity game.
Eleven of 15 raised their hands.
“We’re so inexperienced at the varsity level,” said Reice.
So far it hasn’t shown, which Reice explains thusly: “We’ve had some good success at the jayvee level. At this point they seem to have been able to make that next step.”
One of the few veteran senior starters was Domico, who scored the first goal of the game and assisted on the second and third tallies.
Domico was a spot player for the Redskins for a good part of last year, but he worked his way into the starting lineup and even scored the gamewinner in the playoffs to eliminate Pennsbury and guarantee Neshaminy a state berth.
“He’s fast and he’s pretty strong,” said Reice. “He’s slight, but he’s hard to knock off the ball. He’s scored some big goals.”
With a nearly all-new backfield, Reice has not been confident about building his offense from the defensive third, so instead he has been focusing on a counter-attack style of play.
“We’re mostly a defensive team,” said Domico. “We have to play defense first, make sure no goals are let up, and then we counter-attack. That’s how we get our goals.”
It certainly yielded dividends against the Titans.
In the third minute of play, Central Bucks South’s Keith Crews was in on a breakaway with Neshaminy goalie Mike Klimowicz, but before he could get the shot off, he mishandled the ball giving it up to a Neshaminy defender who cleared it up field.
That quickly Ricky Domico picked it up at the other end of the field and beat Eric Cohen to the top left.
Bingo. South is in a hole from the get-go.
The Redskins made it 2-0 19 seconds later when Domico found Justin Mohn alone. Mohn went in 1v1 on Cohen and dug the hole a bit deeper.
“Every one of them we were up in the defensive third, and we didn’t adjust real well,” said Brady. “We need to do a better job closing down that path coming out of the back, so that we can continue to put pressure on them.”
South nearly made it a new game six minutes into the second half. Keith Crews fired a shot that was headed inside the left post. But Klimowicz was up to the challenge as he dove to his right, stretched out and deflected the ball wide. Doug Brady picked up the rebound and fired another shot, which banged off the left post before it was cleared.
“Bubba (Klimowicz) has been huge,” said Domico. “He’s been playing really well.”
Nine minutes later, Neshaminy scored on a picture-perfect play. Domico launched a pass from the left side to Kyle Martinez on the right wing.
“He called for the ball earlier and I missed him,” said Domico, “so I picked my head up finally and gave him a nice ball, and then Sheridan was good enough to finish it.”
Martinez beat a defender and passed into sophomore Sean Sheridan, who banged a low shot inside the right post.
“The third goal broke our backs,” said Brady.
That was about the extent of the Neshaminy offense as the Redskins were content to hunker in and fend off the Titans’ attack.
And indeed, South dominated most of the second half, outshooting Neshaminy 6-3 and gaining four corner kicks.
“You have to make your chances count,” said Brady. “Neshaminy is a good team. They take care of business here at their place. Unfortunately the score isn’t going to show that it was that much of a match.”
With a head of steam going, Neshaminy will take on Abington Tuesday night on the Ghosts’ home field in the first National Conference match.
“That’s what we needed,” said Domico. “There are no easy teams in our conference. We have to come out and work hard every day.”
Neshaminy (2-0) 3, Central Bucks South (2-1) 0
Goals: Ricky Domico (N), Justin Mohn (N), Sean Sheridan (N)
Assists: Ricky Domico (N) 2, Kyle Martinez (N)
Shots: Neshaminy 5, Central Bucks South 10
Saves: Mike Klimowicz (N) 7, Zach Beegal (N) 0, Eric Cohen (CBS) 2
Corners: Neshaminy 0, Central Bucks South 6
Fouls: Neshaminy 16, Central Bucks South 6
Yellow cards: Ricky Domico (N), Tom Stockhouse (CBS)
Red cards: Brian Hearn (CBS)
- Log in to post comments
0
