With four regular-season games remaining, the Sayreville War Memorial High School boys’ soccer team seeks to build momentum as it prepares for the upcoming Greater Middlesex Conference (GMC) Tournament.
The Bombers have played reasonably well en route to a 5-5-1 record.
Coach Nick Cifelli’s team opened the season with losses to Steinert and New Brunswick, but rebounded to win three straight matches.
In its 11 games, Sayreville has allowed just 18 goals while the Bombers have connected on just 23 goals.
As a result, Cifelli’s team has lost a pair of one-goal games to South Plainfield and Old Bridge, respectively. The coach’s preseason goal was to improve with each game ——and Sayreville has done that.
In its last outing on Oct. 3, Sayreville dropped a 2-1 decision to surging Old Bridge, which sports a 7-4 record. The two teams exchanged goals during the first half, with freshman Zach Colgan tallying for Sayreville, but Old Bridge’s second-half marker with under five minutes remaining was the difference despite six saves by Mohil Trivedi.
On the flip side, Sayreville got a secondhalf goal from Kevin Sousa, his sixth of the season, off of an Ope Olaloke pass and made it stand up in an Oct. 1 victory over Colonia. Trivedi turned aside four shots in keeping a clean sheet.
Prior to the campaign Cifelli was concerned about his defense, but Colgan has settled in as the sweeper. In addition, Tyler Gates, Mustafa Moussa, Eddie O’Connor, Eryk Rachwal and Roberto Salgado have done strong job in front of Trivedi, who has four shutouts.
Sayreville’s offense can be explosive, as the Bombers scored seven goals in a victory over Edison and connected seven times in a victory against Iselin Kennedy.
Fernando Maldonado, who scored 28 times a year ago, has been hampered by an injury, leads the Bombers in scoring with nine goals. Soussa is second with six goals and three assists. Midfielder Matt Barbosa has three goals and Louis Brooks scored twice. Kevin Asare leads the team with five assists and Lucas Pereira has four assists.
“We have a lot guys who can score goals and we’ll need them to step up in the tournaments,” Cifelli said. “We’ve really focused on our defense, which has gotten better, but we can be a difficult team to defend against.”
Sayreville was scheduled to play at home against South Plainfield (9-4) on Tuesday and will travel to Woodbridge (1-10-1) for a 6:30 p.m. match today.