BY: Sean Moylan Sports Writer
“That was the first goal they (Rancocas Valley) gave up to a South Jersey team all season,” said Mike Brennan after his Bordentown Regional High boys’ varsity soccer team tied Rancocas Valley 1-1 last Thursday at Bordentown.
The tie was no fluke either as the Scotties were the team with the 1-0 lead at the half thanks to a gorgeous goal by Babatunde Lawal, which was set up beautifully by a Peter Paye pass.
Lawal dribbled the ball to the end line and made a very nice fake and after that it was just a matter of hitting the spot he had picked out for himself in the goal.
“It was a wonderful individual effort,” added Brennan of Lawal’s goal.
Bordentown’s defense held strong the whole way, and the Scotties’ brilliant young head coach felt the performance of his first-year starting goalie Chris O’Leary was a mature and excellent one.
“Chris O’Leary (11 saves) was fantastic in the RV (Rancocas Valley) game. And he was safe when we needed him to be safe,” added Brennan, who was happy with the way O’Leary kept rebound shots to a minimum and cleared the ball.
This season Brennan’s objective for his club is for them to go all out and do everything they can possibly do within the rules of the game in an effort to secure a win in each and every game. Moreover his club’s always play hard but clean soccer. And while they actually didn’t win last Thursday’s contest, the Scotties fulfilled all of Brennan’s objectives because they played soccer the way it was meant to be played.
“The RV game was a special day for our program. Their goal in the second half didn’t come from a breakdown by us. It was off a re-
start and they worked hard to get it,” said Brennan, who knows how hard it is to hang with a great soccer team like Rancocas Valley.
This past Saturday at Joe Lawrence Park, after a lackluster first half, the Scotties’ offense erupted for a trio of second half goals and Bordentown ended up trouncing Ewing, 4-0.
“In the second half I was really happy with the way we executed in front of the goal,” said Brennan. “I think our midfielders and defenders were working well together.”
Tommy Potts opened up the scoring on goal which was assisted by Lawal, who is coming off a sensational week of soccer. Paye then scored with an assist by Drew Turgyan. And Max Bohanan (assisted by Lawal) and D.J. Kafer (assisted by Guilherme Pacheco) netted Bordentown’s final two goals of the afternoon.
“It’s always better to have goals coming from different places (and players) because it’s always tougher to defend,” said Brennan, who had planned on getting offense from six or seven players from the start of training camp.
It would have been an even bigger blowout but Ewing goalie Kevin Dearden played well, especially in the first half, and made 16 saves. O’Leary needed to stop just a trio of shots to record the shutout.
Originally, Bordentown was supposed to play a night game at Northern Burlington this past Monday. However, NBC had its Back to School Night scheduled for that evening so the game was played on Monday afternoon instead. Because the two schools are located so close to one another and many of the kids from NBC played soccer with Bordentown kids growing up, there is a natural friendly rivalry between the two schools and usually when NBC and Bordentown are pitted against one another it’s a one-goal game either way.
However the Greyhounds are down a little this year and this is shaping up to be a special Bordentown soccer team. Consequently, the Scotties used a strong second half push to beat the Greyhounds, 5-1.
“It was actually a tight game until later in the game. They scored the first one (a Ryan Walsh goal) and it was just a 2-1 game at the half,” said Brennan. “The game was not over until the final five minutes.”
While Turgyan (assisted by Kyle Bijuo) and Bijuo (assisted by Kafer) each fired in a first-half goal, Bordentown did not get a sense it was in the driver’s seat until Potts scored the first of his two consecutive goals early in the second stanza. “On Tommy Potts’ first goal he took a ball from Peter Paye and fired it across to the upper 90 of the far post,” noted Brennan.
After Potts second goal, which was assisted by Lawal, Kafer put the finishing touches on the win by scoring off a Bohanan feed. NBC goalie Steve Fenstermacher made nine saves while O’Leary posted three saves.
“Our defenders Kyle Bijuo, Jason Oros and Jason Zablow are doing a great job of holding the fort in front of Chris (O’Leary),” Brennan added.
Bordentown (4-1-1) is playing its best soccer in years. Bordentown was scheduled to have played a game at Burlington Township yesterday (Wednesday). It is scheduled at Delran on Friday. Next Monday, Bordentown is scheduled to host NBC at Joe Lawrence Park. And on Tuesday, Bordentown is scheduled at Holy Cross.
NBC
NBC is 0-5, but it played great defense in a 1-0 home loss against Delran last Friday.
Fenstermacher stopped seven of the eight shots he faced in the game.
NBC was scheduled to have played Rancocas Valley on the road yesterday (Wednesday). NBC is scheduled to host Cinnaminson on Friday.

