Wednesday, September 16, 2009

By Cory K. Doviak
NJS.com Editorial Director

Joey Farrell scored by crashing the near post midway through the first half and the goal stood up in Ramsey's 1-0 win over Pascack Valley on Tuesday afternoon.

RAMSEY -- The season is barely underway but, make no mistake, Tuesday's boys soccer match between Pascack Valley and Ramsey already had an effect on the race for the NBIL Division 2 title. Ramsey has won the league championship in four of the last fives seasons and this year Pascack Valley is considered to be one of the teams in the chase pack trying to track down a Ramsey team that saw a lot if its offense walk out the door when Nick Gendron graduated in June.

While both teams are still sorting themselves out two games into the season, they were playing for title of team to beat the rest of the way.

“We knew coming in that this game, even this early in the season, could me the league title,” said Ramsey head coach Jaime Phillips. “We knew this was a big hurdle, The last three years we have lost to them the first time we played them, so this was a game that we wanted and needed, really.”

Nick Gazzillo nearly tied the game for Pascack Valley, but his shot was cleared off the line.

And Ramsey got it. Joey Ferrell crashed the net and arrived at the post at about the same time as a cross sent in from the short corner by Tyler Hoitsma and got to it just before it reached the gloves of a charging Justin Sunseri. Ferrell muscled home the game’s lone goal midway through the first half as Ramsey made an early season statement with a 1-0 win on Tuesday afternoon.

“We had the ball down the line and I knew the cross was coming,” said Ferrell a junior striker. “My job there is to crash the net and get in front of the goalie. He [Hoistma] put the ball right there and I just had to tap it in.”

For Ramsey (2-0) finding a way to score figured to be a challenge this season and it is counting on players like Ferrell and a host of others to put away opportunities when they come about. In two games so far, the Rams have scored first and then relied on their stout defense, which is anything but a question mark.

“We’ve talked about how it has to be a team effort up top this season,” said Phillips, whose team opened the season with a 2-0 win over Mahwah. “We have to get a bunch of guys who are going to score five or six goals to try to make up for what we lost with Nick [Gendron]. Today Joey got one and that was good enough.”

Ramsey keeper Chris Grembowiec kept a clean sheet for the second straight game.

Other players being counted upon to put the ball in the net are junior Kevin Doty and seniors Wes Kammerer Sean Pritchard, who was a primary playmaker last season, but now has to be more of the last touch when on the attack.

“Nick Gendron was one of the best players ever to come through Ramsey and this year we don’t have that player who is going to score 20 or 30 goals. Kevin Doty is probably our most talented scorer, but we are not running two forward that are out there for the whole time. What we are doing now is switching and trying to put more pressure on,” said Pritchard. “Nick made me look a lot better than I was. I could send a bad ball up and he would run on it and put it upper corner and I could say it was off my pass. It’s different this year, but we can still be effective.”

By playing from in front against PV, Ramsey gave it offense that much more room to operate as it forced the Indians to try to take more chances pushing up in search of the equalizer. That forced Pascack Valley keeper Justin Sunseri into the spotlight and he kept his team in the game with a variety of tough saves in a five minute span midway through the second half.

PV's AJ Sciemeca morking the midfield.

First he slid out hard to kick away a chance for Doty, who was inches away from being first to a through ball at the top of the penalty area. One minute later Ramsey’s Chuckie Slater got off a rip on the run from the right side, but Sunseri closed down the near post and two minutes after that Pritchard set up Slater, whose left-footed volley was on target but pushed aside by Sunseri bang-bang save.

“We were down 1-0 and we changed ourselves a little bit tactically knowing that there was going to be a chance that Justin was going to have to answer the bell and he did,” said Pascack Valley head coach Roy Nygren. “[Sunseri] is one of those kids that is replacing a big player for us, John Segala, and he did a great job for us today.”

Sunseri kept Pascack Valley in the game and the Indians just about tied it in the 62nd minute. Off a corner kick and the resulting scrum, Nick Gazzillo jumped on a bouncing ball and knocked it on net. The shot got through the pileup in front of the next, but Ramsey’s Giovanni Ormaeche cleared it off the line and Ramsey held on from there.

Gio Ormaeche made the defensive play of the game for Ramsey.

“We were almost able to create one, but they were able to clear it off the line. We were close, but a few times we were a little overanxious in the final third. If we just scan things a little more and make one more pass we might have been a little better off,” said Nygren, whose team opened the season with a win over Pascack Valley. “Hand it to Ramsey. They have been here before, they are comfortable being the hunted in this league and we will try to regroup for the next time around.”

So while Pascack Valley assumes its place in the chase pack, Ramsey stays in front in its quest for another league championship and on path for getting back to where it has been before.

“Our guys have gotten a taste of how good life can be for this program and the goal is to stay there,” said Phillips. “We want to win another league title and get back to the [state] section final and avenge that loss [to River Dell] from last year.”

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