The Guilderland boys soccer team’s perfect season is still intact, but not before Colonie put a scare into the Dutchmen.
The Garnet Raiders had a two-goal lead midway through the second half, but the Dutchmen rallied to pull out a 3-2 overtime victory last Thursday in Colonie.
We feel very blessed and very fortunate, said Guilderland coach Mike Kinnally. `I guess every now and then, you get rewarded for your hard work and playing the right way.`
`Year to year, it seems like every game (with Guilderland) is close,` said Colonie coach Mike Trimarchi. `This time, they just got the bounces.`
Colonie (6-6-1 league, 7-7-1 overall) took the lead on Brad Schlude’s first half goal and doubled its lead early in the second half on a Tom Plowinske tally. From there, the Garnet Raiders hoped that their defense ` which had been tested several times already by Guilderland’s offense ` would hold the advantage.
`We were watching the clock tick down, and we were hoping,` said Trimarchi.
It didn’t work out for Colonie. Sahr Nyuma got Guilderland (12-0, 14-0) on the scoreboard with his team-leading 10th goal of the season midway through the second half. Then, Jonathan Wheeler tallied less than five minutes later to force overtime.
`When we got that second goal, I think that deflated them a little bit,` said Kinnally. `And the last 15 minutes, we dominated play to the point where I thought we could have avoided overtime.`
It didn’t take long into the first overtime period for Guilderland to score the game winner. Tony Campagnano sent a corner kick across the goaltender’s box, where Caleb Ciaschetti was camped out. Ciaschetti knocked the ball past Colonie goaltender Darren Varner to put the Dutchmen ahead for good.
Varner made several crucial saves for Colonie, but he couldn’t fend off a talented Guilderland offense the whole night.
`They have three very solid soccer players in Nyuma, Cam-pagnano and Ryan Ashbaugh,` said Trimarchi. `They’re three very skilled players and (when) you surround those guys with athletes, they’re bound to score some goals.“