Having climbed back to no. 7 in last week’s state Class AA rankings, the Liverpool boys soccer team would not find it easy in the last games it would play before the start of the Section III playoffs.
The Warriors’ big test was supposed to come last Friday afternoon, when Nottingham, holding a 10-0-5 record and the no. 15 state ranking, visited LHS Stadium. But the weather interrupted those plans, ending the game at halftime with the score still 0-0.
They had played before, on Sept. 29, and went the full 80 minutes of regulation and 20 minutes of overtime without settling anything in a 1-1 draw. Here, though, it didn’t even get that far.
A tough, closely played first half ended 0-0, but then rain and lightning struck the Liverpool area. At that point, the two coaches, Doug Nunn and Andy Hazeltine, agreed to postpone the rest of the game, not wanting to expose their players to any possible injuries with the post-season looming.
Before that, Liverpool got a test at West Genesee last Tuesday night, having to work all 80 minutes to get past the Wildcats 2-1.
Despite its 4-9 record, WG had just knocked off Westhill 2-1 on Oct. 10, and would play a superb first half against Liverpool, getting on the board with Joe Gauzza’s unassisted goal and seeing Ryan Mavretish constantly pick up Warriors shots.
All told, Mavretish made 15 saves, but with one goal in each half, Liverpool still finished in front as A.J. Sinclair and Ben Root found the net, while Jeff Meyers earned an assist. Ben Bowers stopped five of the six Wildcats shots he faced.
Ironically, West Genesee would also face Cicero-North Syracuse in Saturday’s regular-season finale, but that followed the Northstars getting a big 3-1 victory over Fayetteville-Manlius last Thursday night at Swan Pond.
Having beaten F-M 2-1 back on Sept. 1, C-NS found itself in another close battle in the early going, as Jacob Koldin’s goal, assisted by Dan Murray, allowed the Hornets to go to halftime tied 1-1 with the Northstars.
But the second half belonged to the visitors, whose well-balanced attack poured through F-M’s defenses. Austin Mizell, with one goal and one assist, led the push, while Ryan Gilbert and Matt Pike also found the net and Brady Engle added an assist. Matt Siegel stopped six of the seven shots he faced.
The game with West Genesee followed, and C-NS took it, prevailing with a 2-0 shutout that gave the Northstars a 9-3-4 record to take into the sectional tournament. Given the no. 3 seed, C-NS would face a tough quarterfinal against no. 6 seed Henninger Thursday night at 6:30 at Gillette.
Liverpool, meanwhile, did draw the top seed, and would await the result of Tuesday’s opening-round game between no. 8 seed Utica Proctor and no. 9 seed Rome Free Academy to find out its quarterfinal opponent.
