The East Windsor PAL Vision, a U-11 girls’ soccer team, traveled down to Brick Township this Memorial Day Weekend and came home with another tournament championship.
The Vision played with excellent skill, aggressiveness and desire throughout the three-day tournament. The Vision offense proved itself potent, scoring 10 goals while only giving up two. On defense, the Vision shut out three of their five opponents.
In Saturday’s games, the Vision beat the Clifton Stallions, 4-0, and the Spartan SC, 2-0. The Vision showed its awesome offense by having five different players score goals on the day and six different players tally assists.
The goal scorers against Clifton were Amanda Archer, Eileen Byrne, Madison Sumners and Emma Pitcher. Assisting them on the goals were Amanda Amodol and Eileen Byrne on the first goal, Kayla Roca with a corner kick on the second, Giselle Chica with a powerful cross on the third, and Olivia Corr with a great seam pass on the fourth.
The goal scorers for the second game against the Spartans were Eileen Byrne and Vanessa Romulus. Teaming up to assist on the first goal were Kayla Roca and Vanessa RomuLus, with Amanda Archer tallying a solo assist on the second goal.
In Sunday’s games the Vision suffered its only loss of the tournament against the Toms River Rage, 1-0, in the first game of the day on a fluke goal when a ball being cleared by a Vision defender ricocheted off another player directly into the goal.
The loss created a "Do or Die" fourth game for the Vision against a strong Hibernian Fusion team for the right to play the undefeated Toms River Rage in the Championship. The Vision quickly rebounded from the disappointing loss, displaying great ball control skills, beautiful passing, and aggressive defensive play to beat the Hibernian Fusion, 3-1, and earn the right to play for the championship on Monday. The Vision’s three goals were scored by Amanda Archer, Erin Dailey and Sarah LeChard, with teammates Morgan Page, Sarah LeChard and Eileen Byrne tallying assists.
In the championship game the Vision was able to avenge its only loss in the tournament by beating the Undefeated Toms River Rage, 1-0, in a hard-fought game.
The game-winning goal came in the second half when Amanda Archer fought hard in the corner to win a ball that she eventually crossed onto the top of the box where mid-fielder Jessica Roca was positioned. Jessica blasted a one-timer that traveled over the goalie’s outstretched arms and into the back of the net for the game-winning goal.
Katie Carduner, who missed the first day of the tournament with illness, came back strong to help her team the last two days of the tournament with her great skills and consistent tenacity that helped her win many 50/50 balls for her team.
A large amount of credit for the championship run has to go to the Vision defense, led by Olivia Corr, Morgan Page, Amanda Amodol, Kayla Roca, Hannah Foss and goalies Sarah LeChard and Katie Kichula, who split games throughout the tournament. A special congratulations goes out to Katie Kichula, who received the Game Ball for her outstanding shutout performance as goalie in the championship game with eight saves.

