South Brunswick High School has a solid boys’ soccer team.
The Vikings are solid enough to have an 8-6 record and a 10th place position in the NJSIAA Central Jersey, Group 4 power points standings. Since 16 teams will make the Central Jersey, Group 4 sectional tournament, the Vikings would make the state tournament if the regular season ended today.
And South Brunswick’s regular season does end soon, on Oct. 12 at Trenton Central High School, so the Vikings almost certainly will make the Central Jersey, Group 4 sectional tournament. After that Trenton Central game, South Brunswick will look ahead to the NJSIAA playoffs, which will begin on Oct. 26 or 29, depending on the Vikings’ seed, matchup and location.
South Brunswick will likely open the tournament with a first round road game, but it will be a tough underdog to knock off. The Vikings are not great at one thing or another, or bad at one thing or another.
They are just a well-rounded club, with four shutout victories and five victories in which they scored three or more goals. On two occasions, Sept. 5 against John P. Stevens High School and Sept. 21 versus J.P. Stevens, South Brunswick scored at least three goals and shut out its opponent in the same game.
The Vikings are capable of playing that well all around, and when they do, they are tough to beat.
South Brunswick’s offense starts with senior Jake Stump, a 6-1, 160-pound midfielder/forward hybrid. Stump has 16 goals this fall. He has scored multiple goals in five different games, and the Vikings are 4-1 in those games.
On Oct. 2 at Old Bridge High School, in a 4-2 South Brunswick victory, Stump broke a 41-yard-old program record for career goals by scoring the 66th goal of his high school career. He is now up to 68 goals for his career.
Stump is the center of the offense, but there is plenty of talent around him, too. Senior midfielder/forward Antonio Iovine has seven goals and five assists this fall.
Senior midfielder/back Sebastiano Villano, senior midfielder/back Cory Petersen, senior midfielder/forward Pasel Mohamed, junior midfielder/back Colin Harbison, senior forward/midfielder Romir Chatterjee and sophomore midfielder/back Ishaan Bhardwaj have all gotten on the score sheet as well.
The Vikings have 63 goals in 14 games, an average of nearly five per game.
But the team can also prevent goals.
South Brunswick has those shutouts, but it has also held two other opponents, Piscataway High School on Sept. 23 and Saint Joseph Regional High School on Oct. 5, to just one goal, and both games were Vikings victories.
The team’s senior goalkeeper, Joseph Mastromonica, has 64 saves and four shutouts. He made nine saves in that victory over Piscataway, which came by just one goal. He stopped three shots in that victory over Saint Joseph Regional, which also came by just one goal.
But the Vikings are not perfect. In all six of their losses, they have allowed at least four goals.
Still, with their prolific offense and usually good defense, the Vikings will be formidable against higher seeded foes in the state sectional tournament. They are a solid team with one of the best scorers in the state, and both those things at least make the Vikings dangerous.