By Bob Nuse, Sports Editor
It’s no secret that Vincenzo Pugliese is the top scoring threat for the West Windsor-Plainsboro High North boys soccer team.
Pugliese leads the Knights with 20 goals this season and draws the most attention from defenses. And that’s quite all right with the Knights.
“We’ve talked about that from the beginning,” WW-P North coach Trevor Warner said. “Vincenzo’s score line is going to make other people better because (defenses) are going to converge on him. If he can get it into his mind to play two-touch and then give it up and work to get the ball back, he can be deadly.
“He did that a little bit more in the second half. In the first half he was taking people on a little bit more, which is in his nature. He’s got a hot motor. he never stops. he knows one speed. He always has people marking him.”
After more than 55 scoreless minutes on Monday, Pugliese broke through and scored a goal to give the Knights the lead in their North Jersey, Section 2 Group III tournament opener against Red Bank Regional. Tommy Bartell, Sanka Sarbadhikary and Alex Quezada would add goals as fourth-seeded North went on to a 4-0 win. The Knights were scheduled to face 12th-seeded Cranford in the quarterfinals on Thursday.
“It makes sense,” Pugliese said of defenses concentrating on stopping his production. “But the goals come from the team. If the next game they see how many goals I have that’s fine. They can put one or two on me because that just leaves somebody else on my team open. Anyone can put the ball in the net and that is all that matters. If they want to put more guys on me that’s fine. It leaves one of our wingers or center-attacking mids who are just as dangerous in front of the net to get the job done.”
The Knights we sluggish in the opening half on Monday but once Pugliese scored everyone seemed to relax and the goals started coming to back the shutout goalkeeping of Oliver Sapon.
“At the beginning of the half I was looking for the through ball and they were doing a very good job with the off-side trap,” Pugliese said. “After the second or third time I knew I had to start paying better attention to the line and where I stand and where the ball is played. I was able to make sure I was in line when the ball was played and I saw the goalie come up so I just had to hit it over thankfully it went in.”
The Knights fended off a couple of challenges from the Bucs early but as the game progressed the home team started to settle in and take control of the game.
“When you are on the road it is tough to chase the game like that,” Warner said. “I think all we needed to get was that one. To Vincenzo’s credit, we put him up top and we thought maybe we could spring him and luckily it worked out. I think we were a better tram. Any time it stays scoreless for that long another team is going to get confident. And then you get a silly bounce here or one good chance and then you’re chasing the game. I think the whole second half we had control of the game and I was happy with the way the guys responded.”
The Knights advanced to face Cranford and with a win would face either top-seeded Hopewell Valley or eighth-seeded West Morris.
“I feel like toward the end of the season with our schedule of games we played some very good soccer,” Pugliese said. “We beat some very good teams and that picked up our level of confidence going into the Mercer County Tournament and we did well. Now we know it is one and done and we have to see how much we care and if we want to keep out season alive.”
The Knights were the only Packet-area team to come away with a win in their state tournament opener on Monday. Princeton, the No. 2 seed in Central Jersey Group IV, was upset by 15th-seeded Manasquan on penalty kicks. Andrew Beamer and Ian Jacobs scored goals in regulation for the Little Tigers, who played Manasquan to a 2-2 tie before falling on PKs.
Also in CJ IV, ninth-seeded Montgomery dropped a 3-0 decision to eighth-seeded Freehold Township. WW-P South, the 13th-seed, dropped a 2-0 decision at fourth-seeded Monroe.
