Junior goalie was busy, but kept a clean sheet for Holy Angels, which opened its season with 1-0, double overtime win over Waldwick on Saturday.
DEMAREST – There are some scoreless soccer games that are real snoozers and others when it almost defies the laws of physics that at least a few balls did not find their way into the back of the net. Saturday morning’s tilt between Academy of Holy Angels and Waldwick, which was without a goal for the first 97 minutes, certainly fell into the latter category.
There was no shortage of opportunities for either team, but with regulation complete, the first overtime done and dusted and most of the second overtime also complete, time was running out for the breakthrough.
Two quick corner kicks in the 97th minute finally named a winner even if the details were a little murky after the fact. What is known that Holy Angels’ junior Lilyanna Potts jumped on a loose ball that spun out of the mixer and walked the ball into the open net. The rest was kind of a blur.
“I don’t even know what was going through my head when I saw the ball in front of me. I just knew I had to put it in because we needed this win. It was almost 100 minutes, we didn’t want to end 0-0,” said Potts, who not only deflected the ball into the net, but also the credit. “Really, it was all team work. I just tapped it in. It came from Xenaya [Medina] and Gabby [Rodriguez] and I just had to finish. We wouldn’t have scored if it wasn’t for everyone working together.”
It was Holy Angels’ season opener and the 1-0 win over a quality Waldwick side was just the kind of start that the start that the Angels were looking for.
Senior Abby Incorvaia gave the defense fits with her abilty on the ball and off.
“I knew this was going to be a tough game. They are one of the best teams in their conference, they are always a solid program and we knew that this game could go either way. That is the way it played out,” said Bill Potkulski, who is in his sixth season as Holy Angels’ head coach. “They had a lot of opportunities, but our backline did a really good job. Between my goalie and the kids in the back, they played really solid.”
Potkulski’s goalie is Emily Vonderhorst and, boy, is she going to be sore on Sunday morning. The junior keeper did not back away from a single challenge and many times she was the one seeking contact. Just over 9 minutes into the second half, Vonderhorst made the first of what turned out to be more then few game-saving plays when Abby Incorvaia sent senior Mayu Nakano through on goal.
Vonderhorst came out low and hard and Nakano did not pull up either. Nakano took the brunt of the contact in the midsection while Vonderhorst picked up a save and some artificial turf-induced road rash.
“Our team keeps me out of trouble most of the time and with [center back] Kat[arina Kondratowicz] in front of me I always feel comfortable, but there are times when there are going to be those 50/50s and I think I have gotten a lot better at winning them over my years at AHA,” said Vonderhorst, who was playing her first competitive game since suffering a knee injury during lacrosse season last spring. “I’ve had some scrimmages, but this was my first real test of it and I got a real test. I had to make a couple of saves, but that is the job of the goalie.”
Lilyanna Potts finally got the Golden Goal for Holy Angels in the 98th minute.
Any goalie or defender trying to match wits with Incorvaia is in for a test. Waldwick’s senior striker is one of the best in Bergen County no matter school size and she is as crafty as she is skilled. She almost scored a bunch of times on Saturday and she set up a bunch of other chances for her running mates, which no longer include her sister, Ava, now a freshman playing at the University at Albany.
In a three minute span midway through the second half Abby Incorvaia was instrumental in two of three quality scoring chances for Waldwick. In the 60th minute she took a shot on the diagonal from left to right and forced Vonderhorst into a diving stop at her far post. Just over one minute later Incorvaia cracked a free kick from 45 yards that struck the framework right where the post meets the crossbar.
The other opportunity in the sequence came from Hannah Reale, who ran onto the second ball off a corner kick and put one on target that was stopped by the gloves of Vonderhorst, who hustled back in time to close down the near post.
Having escaped that flurry, the Angels took their turn. Anna Casale took a chance with her left foot that finished just wide left and Sienna Morreale forced Waldwick keeper Carleigh Nocito into a low save in the 65th minute.
There were a couple of more chances both ways in the waning moments of regulation and there some notable chances in the back half of the first overtime. Incorvaia was taken down just outside the box in nearly the identical spot on the left edge. The first time she blazed the bar and on the second Incorvaia sent the restart into the path of Nakano, whose redirection was saved.
Angelina Urana and the Waldwick defense played 97-plus minutes of scoreless soccer.
Inside the final minute of the first extra session, Holy Angels just about had the game one before Potts’ effort on a breakaway hit the inside of the right post and spit out in the opposite direction. Potts would make up for it officially with 2:44 left in the second overtime.
Waldwick (0-1-1), which opened the season with a tie against Glen Rock on Thursday, is going to be, once again, at or near the top in the NJIC, while Holy Angels is looking to build upon momentum that started with last year’s 10-7-1 record.
It’s never going to be easy for Holy Angels against the stacked schedule it runs up against annually, but the Angels are looking to make a run.
“This is my fourth year here and I really feel like this group of people that we have really have the desire. The energy is so high and hopefully we will be able to keep it up,” said Kondratowicz, who will play at Steven Institute of Technology in Hoboken next year. “This was a good win, but it is just the beginning.”
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