By STEVE BRICKLER
ROCHESTER, N.Y. — Mired in a 1-1 halftime stalemate, top-seeded Aquinas erupted for five second-half goals to advance past eighth seeded Pittsford Mendon 6-1 in the quarterfinals of the Section V Class A Boys’ Soccer tournament.
“We didn’t panic at halftime,” said Aquinas head coach Josh Gleason, “Even though we were losing the physical battle, we knew we needed to have some of the technical things go our way. We came out relaxed and said we need to be brave and move the ball around them.”
The game started out promising for the Li’l Irish as Micaiah Benjamin-Castle put Aquinas on the board just over 2 minutes in after the Mendon goalie handled the ball just outside the 18-yard box. Benjamin-Castle bent a left footed shot over Mendon’s five man wall into the upper right corner of the net for the early lead.
Mendon was undeterred by the goal and started to win the 50/50 battles for loose balls. The Vikings created chances for themselves on free kicks from 40-60 yards away from goal. Junior Colden Forney dropped dangerous balls into the Aquinas box multiple times, and it finally paid dividends in the eighteenth minute when fellow junior Aidan Jones jumped over the Aquinas defenders at the far post and connected on a perfectly timed header into the back of the net from about 15 yards out to tie the game.
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With momentum on their side, the Vikings continued to dictate play through most of the remainder of the half with their physical play. Defensively, Mendon shut off any gaps for Aquinas to play through them and were able to draw the Irish offside numerous times on long diagonal balls.
“I knew in their locker room they were going to have high energy, tradition and (Mendon Coach) Mark Hurley does a phenomenal job,” Gleason said. “Nobody does a better job at getting a team fired up and they took it to us in the first half. Nobody wanted to play Mendon in the quarterfinal round.”
The second half went differently. Aquinas found the feet of its playmakers more frequently than they were able to in the first half and all delivered in some way on the scoresheet in the second half.
Aquinas finally broke through in the second half in the ninth minute when Ali Shabani gathered the ball along the right sideline and lofted a perfect diagonal chip over the last Mendon defender to Ryan Lewin who took it down perfectly towards the back post. Lewin, in turn, sent the ball back across goal to Tin Tin Pasia who tapped it in for his 11th goal on the season and the lead they did not relinquish.
A little over eight minutes later, Aquinas played a quick corner before Mendon was able to get organized. Benjamin-Castle crossed the ball in from the right flank and after bouncing around a bit in the box, the ball dropped to junior Thomas Valentino who buried the ball in the back of the net with a far post shot, his first goal of the season.
With the game becoming more open and the Aquinas midfield able to find more space, the Irish continued their goal scoring spree with three more goals within less than a three minute span. With just over 13 minutes left, Benjamin-Castle beat two defenders on the dribble and found forward JB Leary who was making a diagonal run at the top of the box. When Leary went to turn towards goal, a Mendon defender knocked the ball away that ended up at the feet of Alfonso Vito who clinically finished with a shot to the far post to make it a 4-1 game.
Exactly two minutes later, Lewin played a through ball to Pasia who dribbled straight to the near post and sent a pass across the goal mouth to Vito who was waiting at the far post for the tap in, just as it is drawn up in training. The two goals pushed Vito’s total to 19 on the season. Forty-eight seconds later, Benjamin-Castle played a perfectly weighted through ball to Lewin who went in on a breakaway, dribbled the Mendon keeper and passed the ball into the net for the final margin. The goal was Lewin’s sixth on the season.
“We gave a couple of different looks,” said Gleason of Aquinas’ halftime adjustments. “There’s different things we can do when someone is preparing for us, we can throw different things at people. We moved people around to different spots and it was just a different look. Once we got to three goals we wanted to keep going. I thought the goals were quality too, we had good build up. Super proud of my guys for finding a way to fight and get a W.”
Aquinas (15-0-2) moves on to play the winner of No. 4 Wayne and No. 5 Olympia in the semi-final round, while Mendon closed its season at 8-9-1.
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