ITEM PHOTO BY KATIE MORRISON
Peabody’s Erin Melin and Classical’s Julia Jordan vie for the ball.
By HAROLD RIVERA
LYNN — In Tom Sawyer’s first week as interim coach of the Classical girls soccer team, the Rams are yet to win a game or score a goal. But sometimes the score of a game doesn’t tell the story.
Classical hosted Peabody, the top team in the Northeastern Conference, on Tuesday evening at Manning Field. The good news for the Rams is that goalkeeper Carly Mendonca was outstanding in net with 16 saves. The bad news for Classical is it couldn’t generate any offense and fell to the Tanners, 4-0.
Sawyer, who took over the coaching duties last week when Bob Burns resigned, said that although the results haven’t gone their way, the Rams have shown the effort.
“This is a great group of girls,” Sawyer said. “We’ve had three 4-0 losses, which doesn’t sound that great, but given that the competition was Beverly, Danvers and Peabody, that’s a tremendous amount of improvement from these kids.”
Sawyer, who also coaches the girls basketball team at Classical, credited his assistant coach, Kelly Lombard.
“Nobody likes to lose,” Sawyer said. “We as coaches don’t like to lose, but that’s a tremendous job these kids have done since the beginning of the year. Coach Lombard has done a great job with these kids.”
Classical’s strength this season has been its defense. That was no different on Tuesday as the Rams forced the Tanners to work for their scoring opportunities.
Peabody looked to get an early goal on a corner kick by Chloe Gizzi in the fourth minute, but the ball was cleaned away by the Classical defense.
Gizzi tried again in the fifth minute on a penalty kick but her shot was saved by Mendonca. Deanna Ruggiero tried to get Peabody on the board in the 15th minute but her shot sailed high over the crossbar.
The Tanners pressured Mendonca in the early goings of the contest, much to the liking of Peabody coach Dennis Desroches.
“We have a monster week coming up with some of the top teams,” Desroches said. “We want to make sure that we’re connecting well on the field with possession and using our width.”
Desroches added, “we wanted to make sure we kept it in their zone most of the game, which we did.”
Peabody finally found the back of the net in the 25th minute, when Emily Nelson picked up a corner kick and tipped the ball in for the goal. The assist came from Marissa Orlando.
The Tanners added to the lead in the 38th minute when Gizzi found the net on a long-distance shot with an assist from Amy Drover, giving Peabody a 2-0 lead at halftime.
In the second half, Peabody continued to maintain possession and challenge Mendonca with shots on net. Mendonca rose to the challenge and did everything she could to keep the Rams in the game.
“She (Mendonca) made some outstanding saves today,” Sawyer said. “She did a really nice job of controlling the box and I was very proud of the effort she had.”
Mendonca also received praise from the opposing coach.
“She (Mendonca) was very aggressive to the ball,” Desroches said. “She was fearless going into a crowd and she gets to the ball. You have to give her credit for that, she played very well.”
In the 50th minute, Orlando capitalized on a loose ball to give the Tanners a 3-0 lead.
Classical struggled to generate the necessary offense to climb back into the game.
“What we do against teams like this, is we control one half (of the field),” assistant coach Lombard said. “We have one forward and that’s why we don’t have many opportunities up top.”
Lombard added, “we got the score to be cut in half since the first time we played them. It was 8-0 the first game and this game was 4-0.”
The Tanners added another goal in the 78th minute when Nelson found the net for her second score of the game. With a 4-0 lead, the win was in the bag for Peabody.
For the Rams, Sawyer credited Devyn Astuccio and Sydney Spiess for strong defensive performances.
Classical (4-11-1) will look to bounce back on Wednesday when the Rams host Revere. Peabody (13-1-1) is also back in action on Wednesday when the Tanners host Danvers.