Monday,
October 19, 2015
By Cory K. Doviak
NJS.com Editorial Director
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Sam Moscowitz scored the tying goal 12 minutes into the second half and Northern Highlands went on to a 2-1 win over Bergen Tech in the quarterfinals of the Bergen County Tournament. |
RAMSEY – When Bergen Tech took the field for the quarterfinal round the Bergen County Boys Soccer Tournament on Sunday at Ramsey High School, it was the first time that the program had ever touched the pitch in such a circumstance. The Knights have never been this far in the county tournament and their opponent, Northern Highlands, seems to be there every year.
By pedigree, the Highlanders, who made the county final last season, should have been the more experienced side, the one to be immune to the extra pressure that comes in playoff games this deep in a tournament. Except when you consider that this year’s Highlanders bare little or no resemblance to those successful sides of the recent past.
Highlands’ leading returning goal scorer this season is Sam Moscowitz and his grand total from a year ago was….one. And Moscowitz remembers it well.
“It was the ninth goal, the ninth goal in a game against Pascack Hills,” said Moscowitz. “And it was pretty; near post in the last 10 minutes.”
The Highlanders, this year's No. 7 seed, have zero returning starters and even the head coach is new to the program as Steve Every took the reins after a long stint at Indian Hills.
“It’s a new everything. My biggest challenge was trying to learn all of the kids names before the season started and then of course to try to put them in the right spots,” said Every. “We were able to do that fairly quickly and now we are experiencing some success.”
If success is measured by a 2-1, come-from-behind victory over the No. 2 seed in the quarterfinal round of a county tournament, and most certainly it is, then Northern Highlands is feeling pretty good as it heads into the Final 4 next weekend against No. 3 Tenafly, which knocked out Garfield in Sunday’s nightcap.
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Kenny Gwon's goal in the 18th minutes gave Bergen Tech a 1-0 lead. |
Bergen Tech has been one of North Jersey’s most pleasant surprises this season. With a group of academically gifted student/athletes, the Knights had won 10 of their first 11 games of the year, beat Cliffside Park in the Round of 16 last week and got the jump on Highlands by turning a negative into a positive in the 18th minute.
Senior Kenan Fidan was first to a ball in the middle of the park and was taken down hard by a late slide tackle. The negative was that Fidan limped off with an injury that kept him on the bench for the next 10 minutes, while the positive was that a foul was called and a free kick given. Michael Ozga sent the restart on a line right into the middle of the mixer at the top of the box and it sailed right through. Senior Kenny Gwon was waiting on the backside and knocked it home to give Bergen Tech the 1-0 lead it carried into halftime.
Bergen Tech plays an open style and was not about to put 10 behind the ball and hope to see out the final 40 minutes by lumping the ball out its final third over and over. That led to an entertaining second half full of end-to-end action with both sides having their chances.
Justin Trugman’s perfect timing kept him onside for a good chance six minutes into the second half, but was turned away by the Bergen Tech keeper before Moscowitz stepped up to score the biggest goal of his career to date. He nudged home a long throw-in by Aristoteli Meneve and tied the game at 1 with 27:57 left in regulation.
“Telly [Meneve] threw it in and I knew that I was going to run back post. When he threw it everybody just kind of missed it. It was a hard ball to get too,” said Moscowitz, a senior. “The keeper tried to come out and punch it, but he missed and it fell right to my feet. I was like ‘Oh, my God,’ I have to put this in.”
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Matthew Vaccari set up the game-winner for Northern Highlands, which will play No. 3 Tenafly in the semifinals. |
Bergen Tech had a chance to retake the lead nine minutes later, but it was snuffed out in emphatic fashion. A high bouncer dropped into that no man’s land between an on-rushing keeper and an attacker with his head up trying to track the flight of the ball. The offensive player in this instance was the Knights’ Haram Yang and the keeper was Highlands’ Jase Barrack, who used both fists to punch away the ball and, nearly, Yang’s cranium. No foul was called on the play as it was a 50/50 chance and back-and-forth it went until Highlands eventually wore down its opposition.
“[Northern Highlands] is very quick, they are very athletic and they can play. They move the ball,” said Bergen Tech head coach Nelson Ramirez. “Our plan was to get behind the defense and we did at times, but we were not able to capitalize after the first one. We didn’t finish enough.”
With just over six minutes to play, Matt Vaccari beat a defender with a dribble and won the end line before cutting the ball back across the face of goal for Christian Virgona, who banged it home from inside the six for the deciding goal.
“Matt Vaccari did all the work. He beat the guy down the line, took it to the endline and tapped it across. I just happened to be there and poked it home,” said Virgona, a junior. “The keeper came out and got a touch on it, but it still managed to squeak across the line, lucky for us, but all the credit goes to Matt.”
While Highlands’ latest march through the county tournament will continue next weekend, Bergen Tech left a mark on the tournament before exiting.
“This is the best that we have ever done at the county level and this was a great experience,” said Ramirez. “Now we will prepare for the states and the Vo[cational] Tech [tournament] and that is not easy either. The objective for us it to regroup and then to finish it up sometime around November 20th down at The College of New Jersey.”
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