By John Orrell, Contributing Writer
Westborough – With regular season records not all that disparate, expectations were that the Westborough High boys varsity soccer and visiting Hudson High teams would be staging a fight to the finish when they clashed in their Division 1 first-round matchup Nov. 5.
For nearly the entire first half, both squads chipped away at one another in a scoreless deadlock until the Rangers changed all that in a hurry pouring it on with five goals en route to a 5-0 victory that ended the season for the wounded Hawks. Seventh-seed Westborough (11-3-5) next travels to meet second-seed St. John’s High in quarterfinal play Nov. 7.
Both teams’ defenses dominated in the first half, particularly Westborough, who managed to shut down Central Mass. fourth leading scorer, Mike Conley, who registered 25 goals and six assists in the regular campaign.
“Conley’s a dangerous player and we’ve been fortunate enough to shut him out this season,” said Westborough head coach John Hillier, whose team captured the Midland B title with a win over these Hawks one week ago. “We just have a really strong team and I think we can play with any team out there right now.”
The door flew wide open at the 6:27 mark of the first half when Spencer Nagi, returning from a month-long illness, snapped home the game’s first tally, his first of two, on an unassisted score that saw the junior midfielder cash in on a rebound of his own shot on net to put the Rangers on the board. In just over a minute later, Nagi set up the team’s second score on a well-timed pass to David Linares to send the team into the break up 2-0.
“My first goal was just a bang-bang play,” explained Nagi of what proved to be the game-winner. “Will Kelley shot it right at the goalie and he made a nice save and it bounced right to my foot and I just put it in. It all happened fast.”
Westborough wasted no time increasing their lead as the second half opened. Thomas VonDerVellon found the back of the Hawk net less than a minute in with an assist credited to senior co-captain Collin Priest. Two minutes later, Nagi rifled home his second goal before Priest banged in the team’s fifth, an unassisted rocket that found top left corner.
“We knew a lot about this team because we played them twice this season (1-0 and 2-0 victories),” said senior co-captain and keeper Griffin Barry. “We knew their go-to players and that really helped today as we were able to shut them down and keep playing our own game and not worry about theirs.
“There’s a little bit of pressure in the playoffs, but we like to take it one game at a time. We focus on one game, get the win hopefully and move on to the next. We try to tune everything out and that way nothing unexpected happens.”
“The kids played really well today,” added Hillier. “We’ve been kind of a defensive-minded team but today our offense really got clicking and everything came together. Hudson’s a great team. They won eleven games. We take a lot of pride in having our kids support one another. I’m really proud of the boys.”
For tenth-seed Hudson, it was a successful 2015 with an 11-7-1 record compiled which included a late-season six-game win streak. Having the season end as abruptly as it did was difficult but many from this roster return in 2016 with hopes for better things.
“I’m very proud of the kids. They try so hard. We can always do better. It just didn’t happen today,” said third-year head coach Dimitri Markonidis, who played six years of professional soccer before multiple knee surgeries brought his playing career to an end. “If we score first we can battle but it’s hard for us to come back if we don’t. We don’t have many soccer players and when we have to play from behind it’s very difficult. That’s exactly what happened today.
“We needed to play smarter, especially in the midfield, and that didn’t happen today and we paid for it. I think Westborough has one of the best teams out there and I wish them good luck for the rest of their season.”
Photos/John Orrell