A special autumn is getting put together at East Syracuse Minoa, with both of its varsity soccer teams sporting perfect records going into the last full week of October.
Last week’s action was supposed to be capped by a pair of Friday games between ESM and Jamesville-DeWitt, but they were postponed, to be made up on the afternoon of Nov. 14.
ESM’s girls had already put together a dominant performance against a powerful opponent earlier in the week, taking out previously unbeaten Central Square 6-1 last Tuesday at Spartan Stadium.
Even though the Redhawks brought a 3-0 record into the game, the Spartans attacked hard from the outset and saw a breakout performance from freshman forward Leah Rehm.
All that Rehm did in the first half was produce a natural hat trick, scoring three times to establish a 3-0 margin. Not stopping there, she added another goal in the second half and assisted on tallies from Lina Polcaro and Gianna Coccagnia.
Along the way, Jenna Hudgins, Natalie Peterson and Jazzel Meikleham also picked up assists, while Isabelle Chavoustie had six saves, only allowing a second-half goal from Cora Keohane.
As that went on, J-D handled Oswego 4-0, leaning its attack on the duo of Megan Baker and Lindsay Hildreth, each of whom scored twice.
When the game between ESM and J-D was called off, the Spartans quickly scheduled a match against Skaneateles, where Rehm somehow improved on her Central Square effort and dominated a 5-0 shutout of the Lakers.
For the second game in a row, Rehm had three goals before halftime, two of which were assisted by Polcaro. Then Rehm put in the other two tallies in the second half to give her five for the night and nine goals for the week overall.
Aside from Polcaro, Peterson, Meikleham and Abby Hudgins all picked up assists, too, and Chavoustie turned away all six of the shots Skaneateles sent to her.
The ESM boys team had its own game against Skaneateles, who won the state Class B championship a year ago and was 4-1 entering this game.
But the Spartans jumped all over the Lakers in the first half, finding the net five times on the way to a 6-3 victory.
Jordan Sanson scored just two minutes into the game. Christian Moon got a goal three minutes later, Evan deBerjeois made it 3-0 and Zach Shufelt struck twice, once off a throw-in and again on a long-distance shot right before halftime.
Skaneateles tried to rally in the second half and did score three times, but the deficit was too much to overcome as Eric Callahan tacked on a Spartans goal. James Ferns, Matt Kenney, Armin Osmanovic joined deBerjeois in the assist column.
Before the postponements, J-D was coming off last Tuesday’s 6-0 romp over Oswego, the Rams scoring three times in each half and spreading its production around.
Only Max MacCaull scored twice, with single goals going to Aiden Scott, Johnny Keib, Will Quackenbush and T.J. Tanner. Andrej Dovciak, Tom Sabatino and Jake Mone had one assist apiece.
At the same time, ESM was handling Central Square its first defeat of the season in a 2-0 decision.
The Spartans’ defense stymied the Redhawks and held them to just two shots. ESM had far more opportunities, with Kenney and Moon able to convert goals as Shufelt earned an assist.
In the revamped schedule, ESM and J-D will square off first Nov. 4 before the rescheduled rematches 10 days later and the boys Spartans will take on Fayetteville-Manlius this Saturday at 10 a.m.
