NORTHEAST PHILADELPHIA – Under the bright lights of Father Judge’s sports complex, the Crusader’s defended their home turf Friday night. In the first round of the PCL playoffs, Father Judge faced off against Archbishop Carroll High School.
The two teams squared off in the regular season, in which the Crusaders took down the Patriots, 5-0.
Carroll’s head coach, Brian Santangelo, brought his team to play Friday night. Focused on playing good defense, Carroll fought for an upset.
No. 2 Judge will face No. 3 Roman on Weds. at UGH at 7:45 - PSD Photo
On the opposite side, Father Judge head coach, John Dunlap urged his boys to start fast, and that’s exactly what they did. A distinct feature of this year’s Father Judge soccer team has been the great play of midfielders, Sean McCormick, and Adam Nork, not to mention they both have great heads of red hair.
“We felt pretty confident coming into the game,” coach Dunlap said. “We’re healthy for once, and we’re starting to play a little more of our style. Tonight, I don’t think we played our best possession, but we were effective. It was a little more open then we would like it to.”
Start fast these two did. In the 4th minute, Nork slid a ball behind the Carroll backline. With 40 yards of space behind the defense, McCormick read the pass and burst through the center of the field leaving the Carroll defenders behind him.
Carroll’s goalie charged the ball, and was about to dive on it. Before he could grab it, McCormick touched the ball enough to change its path around the keeper and into the goal. Father Judge grabbed the lead early, 1-0.
Judge continued to press Carroll and the backline for most of the half. However, Carroll saw some good chances themselves. Most of the good play started with Vito Vincent, who constantly charged Father Judge’s defense, making two or three men miss at a time. Still, Father Judge defended as a unit and stopped Carroll from really testing their goalie.
Carroll’s defense, backed up by the great play of their goalie, was just settling into the game when a harsh call would put Judge into a great position to score.
After breaking through the Carroll back line the first time, Judge continued to try to beat Carroll with well placed through balls. A through ball again saw McCormick on a break away, but a defender was with him. As the two came together for a tackle, the ball ended up bouncing off the Carroll defender and back to the goalie. The far side referee called it a back pass and the goalie was charged with a handball inside his own box.
PCL Quarterfinal Judge vs. Carroll (28 Photos)
The play resulted in a free kick inside the box, which allowed Carroll to line their whole team up as a wall to stop it. However, wall did not suffice as Davis Habilaj blasted it in the upper right corner to double the Crusader’s lead, 2-0.
The game became tense after the call. Carroll started the 2nd half with intensity, looking for a way back into the game, but soon Father Judge regained control. Carroll’s hope was kept alive by the play of Jake Langley, who made great saves at every stage of this game.
With 14 minutes left, McCormick again received a ball on the right side of the pitch, and burned Carroll’s back line to get in on goal and score his second goal of the night. Judge would have one more opportunity to score on a penalty kick late in the game, but Langley made two great saves in one play to keep the ball out of the back of the net, leading to a final score: Judge 3, Carroll 0.
“We’re not a run and gun type of team, but I think we had four breakaways, and we didn’t capitalize on them. I thought we were forcing the situation instead of letting them develop,” said Dunlap. “We were running 40 or 50 yards to the net, so by the time you get up there, the keepers thinking, and your running 40 yards by the time you get a shot. We like being 20 or 30 yards in where we can take a touch to it [the ball] and slide it in. 40-50 is a little to long for my liking. We will go back and look at that Monday, and see if it works.”
This Wednesday, Father Judge will face off against Roman Catholic in the PCL semifinal at the United German Hungarian Club. The game is scheduled to being at 7:45PM following the La Salle vs. Wood match-up.