Coughlin Steps It Up To Victory The Crusaders Will Meet Abington Heights On Friday For The District 2 Class 3a Title.
By MICHAEL LELLO [email protected]
Wednesday, October 31, 2001 Page: 1B
WILKES-BARRE TWP. – Tuesday’s District 2 Class 3A semifinal game was a tale of
two teams, but not in the traditional sense. It wasn’t a case of Coughlin and
Wyoming Valley West. The two key teams here were Coughlin in the first half
and Coughlin in the second half.
And while the Crusaders kept their same lineup on the field and didn’t make
any wholesale strategic changes in the second half, there was a noticeable yet
intangible difference in the squad in the second half of Tuesday’s 4-2 win at
Betzler fields.
“I think the kids stepped up and became a lot more intense,” said
Coughlin coach Barry Trievel, whose team will face Abington Heights in the
final at 2:30 p.m. Friday at Betzler Fields. “In the first half, (Valley
West) was playing with more desire. It wasn’t any kind of tactical maneuvering
that won this game. It was the desire of the kids that put it together
fortunately in time to turn things around.”
Valley West’s coach noticed it, too.
“It was two different teams,” Ted Tsioles said. “In the first half, I
thought we outplayed them and just couldn’t capitalize, and in the second half
they were a little bit tougher.”
It was the third hard-fought game this season between the Crusaders
(15-3-1) and the Spartans (15-3-1), last year’s district champion, with the
Crusaders claiming the series 2-0-1 after tying and beating Valley West during
the Wyoming Valley Conference regular season.
Ryan Kozemko scored first Tuesday when he knocked in a header after
teammate Mike Evanofski’s shot deflected off the hands of Valley West
goalkeeper Dominick Proctor with 22:41 left in the first. Jonathan Schmid, the
WVC’s leading scorer, tied it up with 9:28 to go when he took a Brandon Prego
pass and blasted it into the net from 18 yards out.
With the game deadlocked at one entering the second half, the Spartans,
playing with the wind at their backs, were in position to take the momentum,
but Kozemko made sure that wouldn’t happen when he scored an empty-net goal
while Proctor was defending outside the mouth of the net with 8:15 left in the
game.
Freshman Steve Ference then made it 3-1 off a Dustin Laird assist, and
Brian Tarulli put the game out of reach when he found the back of the net off
a Ference pass.
Valley West’s Scott Poplawski’s shot caromed off the crossbar and Rob Klug
recovered to punch it in with 36 seconds left, but it was too little too late
for the Spartans.
“That’s been the story of the three times we’ve played them this year,”
Trievel said. “It’s been very even, back-and-forth types of games. We were
very fortunate to get that third goal in there and get the extra one before
the end of the game. It was nip and tuck the whole way. It’s been a great
series with them this year.”
Coughlin goalkeeper T.J. Baloga left the game after colliding with a
Spartan player while making a save 22 minutes into the contest, but returned
in the second half.
