Whether making the short jaunt to the Cortland area, or the much longer journey to the Hudson River valley city of Middletown, Jamesville-DeWitt soccer fans will be traveling plenty next weekend – and will feel glad to do so.
The boys and girls Red Rams are both headed to the state final four, thanks to impressive runs through the regional playoffs that culminated with strong victories on Saturday afternoon.
At Liverpool High School Stadium, J-D’s boys turned back Section VII champion Peru 4-0, while up north, at Ogdensburg Free Academy, the girls Red Rams earned its second state semifinal berth in three years by stomping past Section X champion Massena 8-0.
Coming off a 2-0 regional win over South Glens Falls last Wednesday at Morrisville State College where it had scored both of its goals in the second half, J-D’s boys did not want to wait as long to get on the board against Peru.
That wish was granted just 2:05 into the contest when Jordan VanStry sprinted up the middle and, taking a long pass, quickly sent a shot past Indians goalie Tristan Archambault.
Perhaps expecting a flood of goals, J-D instead relaxed and found itself in a defensive mode for a long stretch of the first half, culminating in goalie David Newman making a sliding stop in the 23rd minute well out of his net to keep Peru from pulling even.
Still, the game was within reach for the Indians until the 37th minute, when Nate Shimer’s pass from the left corner found Tyler Lichtenstein, and the junior poured it into the left side of the net.
With a 2-0 halftime cushion, the Rams relaxed, and early in the second half VanStry produced his second goal. Seven minutes later, Lichtenstein, open on the left side, sent a screaming side-footed shot that zipped past Archambault.
In addition to his pair of goals, VanStry earned an assist, joining Shimer, Jacob Brazie and Charlie Digristina in the assist column. And J-D’s defense offered solid protection to Newman, who finished with three saves and his second straight state playoff shutout.
Earlier in the day, J-D’s girls team, who had stunned Scotia-Glenville by scoring all of its goals in the first half of a 6-0 romp in Tuesday’s regional opener at Fulton, managed to top that production against a Massena side overmatched from the start.
In constant attack mode, the Rams couldn’t quite match the Scotia-Glenville surge, but still led 5-0 at halftime, and then kept on adding to that total, taking no chances to make sure that its state final four trip was secure.
Paige Sherling, with a pair of goals, led an offense where seven different players found the net. Alex Epifani, Ali Durkin, Allie Balotin, Angela Bussone, Amber Hyatt and Lainey Foti had one goal apiece as Alex Catanzarite earned a pair of assists. Erin Brinley, Elena Haarer, Kallen Prosak and Caroline Kopp each got one assist.
This leads to a super Saturday of state Class A soccer semifinals. At 8:30 a.m. at Middletown High School, J-D’s boys meets the Long Island champion, East Hampton (Section XI), looking to advance to Sunday’s final at 10:30 a.m. against Greece Athena (Section V) or Byram Hills (Section I).
Meanwhile, the girls Red Rams wait until 2:30 on Saturday to play its state Class A semifinal against Somers (Section I) at Tompkins-Cortland Community College.
The winner goes to the Class A state final at SUNY-Cortland on Sunday at 12:15. against Pittsford Mendon (Section V) or South Side (Section XI), who beat J-D in that 2012 state title game and has won a record 17 state championships overall.
