A top seed, and a recent championship run, guarantees nothing, for each year the process renews itself and those who have won before must prove themselves again.
Westhill, the defending Section III Class B boys soccer champions and the top seed again in 2017, had to grind out a 1-0 decision over no. 4 seed South Jefferson in Thursday night’s sectional semifinal at Cicero-North Syracuse’s Bragman Stadium.
Marcellus wanted to join the Warriors in the final Monday night, but lost, 3-1, to no. 2 seed Cazenovia in the other semifinal at Jamesville-DeWitt, ending its bid for a first sectional championship since winning the state title in 2009.
What’s more, Bishop Ludden, the top seed in Class D and the sectional Class C champions a year ago, got ousted in the semifinals, too, beaten 3-0 by no. 4 seed Poland at Chittenango High School.
Though Westhill (no. 5 in the latest state Class B rankings) breezed through two early-round sectional games over Mexico and Camden by a combined 10-0 margin, it found nothing easy about South Jefferson, whose resume included a win over Cazenovia earlier in the month.
All through the first half, the Warriors probed and prodded against the Spartans’ defense, but could not break through. South Jefferson goalie Connor LaLone was on his way to eight saves and the kind of effort that might produce an upset if his teammates could help out.
Westhill was patient, though, and in the 52nd minute broke through. It came when freshman Bo BenYehuda, gaining possession left of the net, beat his defender and drilled a low shot past LaLone just inside the right post.
The rest was left to the Warriors’ defense, which shut out an opponent for the 14th time this fall by blocking all of the space that South Jefferson wanted to find. The Spartans did not manage a direct shot against John Geer all night.
To the south, on J-D’s turf, Marcellus, with two playoff shutouts of its own (7-0 over General Brown, 2-0 over Clinton) behind them, looked to topple the same Cazenovia side it beat 2-1 early in September.
It looked, at the outset, like the Mustangs would do so, attacking hard and going in front 1-0 less than nine minutes into the game on a nice touch pass from David Bosak to Carter Austin, who from point-blank range put it past Thomas Bragg.
By the midway point of the half, though, the Lakers were settling down on both ends. Defensively, the Lakers gradually stifled anything Marcellus tried to establish, leading to plenty of frustration..
On the other end, Ryan Modzeleski began to take over when Cazenovia was awarded a free kick in the 35th minute. Modzeleski shot low, past the wall and just inside the right post past Sam Hayduke, to tie it, 1-1, where it stood at halftime.
This carried over into the second half with a string of Lakers attacks, and in the 52nd minute Modzeleski drove past two defenders on the right side and took a hard shot that Hayduke could not gather in, allowing Alex Pezzi to jump in and put the rebound into the unoccupied net.
Not sitting on its 2-1 lead, Cazenovia continued to keep the ball in the Marcellus end, the work paying off when Modzeleski took another run down the right side, and this time shot it past Hayduke for the clincher.
Marcellus finished at 15-4, feeling the same disappointment that ate at Bishop Ludden after seeing its dream of back-to-back sectional titles get snuffed out by Poland.
In reality, what happened in the opening minutes stunned the Gaelic Knights. From more than 30 yards out, Poland’s Dale Lepper sent a long, arcing shot that eluded Ludden goalie Josh Bianchi and crashed into the top left corner of the net.
Though the Tornadoes didn’t score the rest of the half, Ludden found itself unable to answer, and down 1-0, the Gaelic Knights saw it get away when Kade Ozog burned them for back-to-back goals in the second half, one of them assisted by Lepper.
Bianchi finished the night with 13 saves, but none of Ludden’s eight shots got past Poland goalie Connor Broadbent as the Tornadoes advanced to Monday’s final against no. 2 seed Lyme, who beat no. 3 seed Manlius-Pebble Hill 1-0.
Finishing its season at 15-4, Ludden will see its OHSL Patriot division player of the year, Lucas Scutari, graduate, as well as seniors Liam Katko, Cole Reale and Cam Kaminski, though a large and talented group returns for 2018.
