Sunday,
October 26, 2014
By Cory K. Doviak
NJS.com Editorial Director
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For the second straight year, Wayne Hills celebrated a 1-0 win over Clifton in the Passaic County Tournament final. This time it took double overtime. |
WAYNE – Wayne Hills' Sabrina Sirni is a senior and she wanted to play a more direct role in deciding the outcome of her last ever Passaic County Tournament game. After a scoreless 80 minutes of regulation and then another 10 in the first overtime against Clifton in the county final, Sirni asked head coach Gregg Rehberger if she could move from the midfield to a more forward position to try to make something happen.
“She is a senior so I figured why not give it a shot and see what happens,” said Rehberger. “I knew she would attack, I knew she would go to the goal and so I went with her on that [request].”
So the coach acquiesced and the rest is now a piece of Passaic County girls soccer history.
Sirni ran onto a ball played toward the middle by Callen Vander May from the left touchline and used two dribbles with her right foot to take on two different defenders. The third touch was either going to have to be another right-footer that would likely have taken her to a tough shooting angle or one with her left foot at the goal.
Sirni chose the latter and lofted a beauty that floated just over the outstretched fingertips of Cindy Espinal, Clifton's well-positioned goalie. When the ball ducked under the crossbar and tucked itself into the roof of the net, Wayne Hills secured its second straight county title with a 1-0 victory on Saturday at Wayne Valley High School.
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Danielle LoBue was in the middle of many of Clifton's most dangerous county attacks. |
“It's my senior year and I wanted this more than anything. The amount of effort this group of girls has put in has been insane and we did not want to share a [county] title. I asked to move forward and I had to prove that my decision was right. That is what I did and I am happy about that,” said Sirni “I am actually a better shooter with my left [foot] and that was the only way I was going to be able to finish it right away.”
With one perfectly placed shot, Sirni finished the play, the game and the 2014 county tournament in style. But before that there were plenty of anxious moments for both sides as Wayne Hills had the edge in possession, but Clifton generated many of the game's most dangerous chances with its speedy counter attacks.
The first one, just over seven minutes in, left a mark on the goalie if not the goal. Marisa Ale came racing in on a 1-v-1 situation and was met by Wayne Hills keeper Erica Knudsen, who went out low and hard. There was a collision and a loose ball that was cleared off the line by Vander May and Knudsen played the rest of game with swelling just below the brow of her left eye that grew progressively worse over the next 89 minutes of action.
There is the old sports cliché about a player looking like he or she had just been in a 12 round fight, but in this instance there is really no other way to describe it. Knudsen looked like she had been hit with a right hook.
“In, literally, the first play I had Marisa Ale had a breakaway and rocked me in the face. I couldn't open my eye for the first 30 minutes after it happened, but there was no way I was coming out of this game,” said Knudsen, who finished with five saves. “This was so stressful, but being in a game like this; a county final that goes into double overtime and Golden Goal and winning it can really help us. We got the county title and we can use this to help us go really far in the states.”
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Wayne Hills' Sabrina Sirni scored the game's lone goal with just over four minutes left in the second overtime. |
Ale created another dangerous opportunity late in the first half when she stepped through two defenders and hit a rip on goal, but Knudsen was there to pick off the line drive and keep it scoreless heading into the intermission.
It was in the final 12 minutes of regulation when both teams seemed to realize the onset of desperate times and both went after the victory. Wayne Hills put together a nifty combination off a free kick from its defensive half as Vander May rolled the restart into space in the middle of the field. Brook Adamchak had time to weigh her options before a defender arrived and chose a 1-2 perfectly worked with Meaghan Griffin, whose first touch was a drop right back to Adamchak, who fired just wide right from 22 yards.
With under four minutes to play in regulation, Deana Abdou sent in a cross that took a deflection onto the foot of Griffin, who put her laces on it only to be stymied by Espinal, who held her line and made a steady save. Overtime was just seconds away when Clifton gave a game-winner a go. Meaghan Mancini got free up the right and served one into the middle of the field. Daniella LoBue kept it moving for Ale, who was in dangerous spot, but Brooke Kowalski, hustling back into the play, got a foot in there to break up the timing and make extra time a necessity.
“I think both teams created multiple chances for themselves the whole way and I thought it was a well played game that could have gone either way. We tried to keep pressing. There was no holding back and playing for a tie. We wanted to win this game,” said Clifton head coach Konrad Kruczek. “They were making us work defensively with their possession and the best way for us to deal with that was to press up every chance we got and I thought we were going to get one.”
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Clifton keeper Cindy Espinal made a couple of standout saves. |
That elusive goal did look like it was going to be Clifton's in the first overtime. Wayne Hills threw just about everyone on into box on a corner kick in the 85th minute, but when the ball went through the scrum in front of goal, the Mustangs were quick on the counter. Olivia De Muro chased the ball down in the corner and played it forward to Catherine Jordan, who gained the center stripe before sending in Mancini, who cut in from the right and fired just wide to the short side.
Clifton looked the fresher side in the first extra session, but Wayne Hills had the last chance in it when Griffin clanged one off the football crossbar in the 87th minute.
“We had some girls that put in a lot of minutes and they were really getting tired when the overtime came around. We had the wind with us in the first overtime and we hoped we could produce something. It didn't work so we just had to fight through it,” said Rehberger. “And I was definitely concerned about them scoring a counterattack goal against us.”
Wayne Hills was recharged for the second overtime and only an brilliant stop by Espinal one minute in kept the Mustangs in it. Adamchak got her laces through a bouncer that fell to her feet 30 yards from goal, but Espinal, in full dive, got up to the top corner to direct it around the post. But, just less than five minutes later, Vander May made her way up the left side and flipped the ball into the middle of the field just as a defender stepped to. Sirni ran on and then the rest of her teammates followed in celebration.
“I lost my contact [in the pile], so I can't even see, but we do that every year and it is a great,” said Sirni. “I love these girls and we all wanted this so bad.”
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