BY RICHARD JEROME
Staff Writer
JEFFGRANIT staff East Brunswick’s Brianne Russo puts her head on the ball during a recent game against J.P. Stevens in East Brunswick. With a 7-5-1 record and four matches left before the state tournament cutoff date, the South River High School girls soccer team is a good bet to win a berth.
And coach Sarah Stout is pleased with the Rams’ progress.
“We were a little bit rocky at the beginning, and we had some injuries,” she said. “But we’ve improved. We have a tough schedule with three games a week against larger schools like Piscataway and New Brunswick. We’ve lost a couple to 13-1 Spotswood, but we’ve played them tough. And we beat Metuchen, who won the division last year.”
Stout points to the Ram defense as the key to the club’s success this season, starting with goalkeeper Steph Francis, a former field player who has stepped up admirably.
“She’s a really smart player and she leads the defense,” Stout said of the junior.
At sweeper, SRHS fields junior Jennie O’Hara, who is new to the position, but has excelled. Junior Emily Applegate is at stopper, while on the outside Molly Gunderson teams up with sophomore Danielle Nale.
“The great thing is that the entire defense will be back next year,” Stout points out.
On offense, Sarah Petruska, a senior, has been the leading scorer, seconded by senior Milli Kahse, at center midfield.
“She controls the game well defensively and offensively, and has scored some key goals for us,” said her coach.
Junior Katie Russell is at center midfield, while at outside halfback the Rams have senior Nobuko Hori and junior Cherubin Rena. Coming off the bench are freshmen Kara Russell and Amanda Roshetar and junior Jess Gomez.
Stout, assisted by Chris Brasno, led the Rams against JFK yesterday; a big match with Metuchen looms tomorrow.
“I’d like to see us play hard for the rest of the season,” she said. “We just have to play our own game and not let the other team dictate the action.”
Bomber loss creates three-way tie atop White Division
A funny thing happened during halftime of the Sayreville-Colonia game on Tuesday.
The officials determined the field conditions had become unplayable, and ended the game, with Colonia holding a 2-0 lead. The decision left both the Sayreville and Colonia coach scratching their heads, especially since the JV game, being played at Iselin Middle School on similar field conditions, was not only completed but went into overtime.
Nonetheless, the Patriot win created a logjam atop the GMC White Division, with Sayreville, Woodbridge and Colonia all holding a piece of the lead with two division losses. This race appears destined to come down to the wire, which is good news for the Bombers.
Sayreville has rolled against every other team in the White Division, going 8-0, while losing to Colonia both times they faced them. Tomorrow, the Bombers will face Woodbridge in a game which should decide the title fate of both teams.
The Monroe Falcons have played quite a role in creating the mess atop the White Division standings. The Falcons beat both Woodbridge and Colonia, 1-0, on back-to-back days. And the 1-0 scores are not a fair reflection of just how much Monroe dominated both games.
With their stellar recent play, the Falcons (9-3) have played their way back into the divisional race and have emerged as one of the hottest teams in the GMC with the postseason tournaments looming in the near future.
One thing is for certain: nobody will be taking Monroe lightly the rest of the way.
Among the other local teams gearing up for the postseason are the Spotswood Chargers and the East Brunswick Bears, a pair of squads that have virtually locked up their division titles already. The Chargers improved to 13-1 with their win over rival South River on Monday, while the Bears, the Red Division leaders, entered the week at 10-1, having outscored opponents 32-6 this year.
While the Bears will enter the tournament as the favorite, the Chargers are somewhat of an enigma. Head coach Kevin Brady’s squad is unquestionably the top team in the Blue Division, but just how well the Chargers match up against some of the GMC’s elite squads remains to be seen. In their one game against a White Division team, they lost to Colonia, 1-0, despite outshooting the Pats, 9-7.
The Old Bridge Knights improved to 6-4-2 with a 2-1 win over J.P. Stevens on Monday. The Knights have shown the ability to come up big in a tough spot, as evidenced by their win over East Brunswick earlier this year. And playing a very tough out-of-conference schedule makes this team even more dangerous in the postseason.