By: Sean Moylan Sports Writer
After eight of his starting players suffered serious injuries, Bordentown Regional High girls’ varsity soccer head coach Dominick Castaldo had to do some serious lineup-shuffling just to put a competitive team on the field.
However, over the last three weeks something beautiful has been happening in Bordentown as players who were originally slated to spend the entire season with the junior varsity squad are now key members of the Scotties varsity unit. Veterans like Kiley Dougherty and Nicole Walls have developed into coaches and leaders on the field. And with two victories this past week, Bordentown has somehow, some way, climbed back over .500 at 6-5-1.
“They’ve worked hard to get back to this point knowing where they came from,” said Castaldo, whose team is currently on a four-
game winning streak.
This past Tuesday night at Maple Shade, Bordentown won, 4-1.
With an assist by Lauren Donaher, Sheila Frank scored the only goal of the first half. Then in the second half, Lauren Donaher set up a goal by Dougherty and Jenna Adams tallied to give Bordentown a 3-0 lead. Then after Maple Shade’s Alissa Pacheco scored to cut the Scotties’ lead to two goals, Kayla Pagnani knocked in a goal and the Scotties could all but put the win in the books.
Bordentown outshot Maple Shade, 16-8, and Scotties’ goalie Nicole Walls had four saves.
“I can’t say that any one person shined but we played better as a team today (Tuesday),” said Castaldo after the Maple Shade game. “Since the second half of last Friday’s game against Burlington Township and in today’s game we’ve started to finish better.”
Although the Scotties defeated the Falcons by a 3-0 score last Friday at Burlington Township, it needed for Walls to be brilliant and make 17 saves, many of which were spectacular, to win it.
“I didn’t feel we played really well (early). We scored with 10 or 11 seconds left in the first half (on a Pagnani goal assisted by Frank). And we held on after that, and I mean we held on, because we had girls who didn’t play well that day. Nicole Walls came up really big for us in that game. If she was anything less than she was, and she was making game-saving save after game-saving save, it’s a different game,” said Castaldo. “All they needed to do was score one goal and the game could have changed.”
In the last 10 minutes of the second half, the Scotties more than picked up their game as Frank and Pagnani (assisted by Brianna Bogdan) both scored insurance goals. Bordentown finished the game with 14 shots on goal. Moreover, the bottom line was the Scotties won the game and inched closer to the post season.
“We’re getting the job done,” said Castaldo, who knows the value of any win at this point of the season. If Bordentown can make the playoffs then Castaldo should get consideration for Coach of the Year. Because, even though the Scotties field an excellent team every game even with all of their injuries, every time you take a player out of the lineup and replace her with a new player, it changes the whole chemistry of the team. But Castaldo has somehow made that ever-changing chemistry work nonetheless. That’s why he’s a Hall of Fame soccer coach. Of course the girls have had to buy into his master plan and work hard to bring it to fruition.
Something beautiful is happening in Bordentown. Let’s hope it doesn’t end any time soon.
Bordentown is scheduled to host Cinnaminson today (Thursday). It is scheduled at Palmyra on Friday. Bordentown is scheduled at Delran next Wednesday.
FLORENCE
The Florence girls’ soccer team was defeated by Palmyra (2-1) and BCIT Medford (1-0) this past week.
Florence is scheduled to play at Holy Cross 3:45 p.m. today (Thursday).
NBC
The Northern Burlington High girls’ soccer team was defeated by Moorestown (3-0), Delran (2-1) and Holy Cross (7-0) this past week.
Northern Burlington will host Robbinsville 1 p.m. on Saturday and Burlington City at 3:45 p.m. on Monday.

