LYNN — St. Mary’s is the city champion in both boys and girls soccer, by virtue of Saturday night’s twin killings of Lynn Classical (2-1 in the girls championship game; 1-0 in the boys’ contest).
However, the closeness of those scores is a bit deceptive. Both goalkeepers for the Rams kept their teams in their respective games.Junior Carly Mendonca played a marvelous game for the girls in keeping the Spartans within striking distance.
“She was tremendous,” said first-year coach Mark Ierardi. “She was really, really good.”
But after Classical’s Isabel McGaughey scored in the third minute on a direct kick that almost blooped its way into the St. Mary’s net, the Rams were stopped cold. A lot of that had to do with tournament MVP Mia Nikolakopoulos, who patrolled the middle like a sentry, keeping Classical from making any progress at all upfield.
“It’s good to have her back,” said St. Mary’s coach Jim Foley, referring to the fact that NIkolakopoulos missed last season with an ACL injury. “She’s not 100 percent there, yet, but you can see her improving. She’ll be much further along later in the season.
“But she controlled the middle of the field,” he said. “Having her back for this season is like getting a new player.”
It took a while for St. Mary’s to get going, but once the Spartans did, they kept the pressure on Mendonca, who kept batting shots away. The Spartans got the game-tying goal from Susannah Cornell midway through the first half on a shot from Mendonca’s left. And Gabby Diaz Martinez ended up with the game-winner.
“I thought we played well,” said Ierardi. “That’s probably one of the better teams we’re going to play, and if we can get an effort like that out of the girls in every game, we should be fine.”
“We always look forward to this tournament,” said Foley, whose team defended its championship from last season. “And this was a good win for us. Mark’s a good coach and he’s going to do a great job.”
In the consolation game, English defeated Tech, 6-0, with Tommi Hill getting the shutout. Alex Zayas scored twice, as did Ravyn Rapley, Sydney Denham, Lauren Moorehouse and Katelyn Bowden.
Coach Ed McNeil said tora Ueland and Grace Gately also played well.
The boys game came down to a direct kick with just over four minutes left in the game, as the result of a handball call on the Rams. Nolan Perez of the Spartans converted the kick, booting it just out of the reach of Classical keeper Daniel Cotres.
“It was kind of a tough call for that time in the game,” said Classical coach Dominick Steadman.
Similar to the girls game, St. Mary’s got the better of the action, but Cotres was equal to the task.
“He very definitely kept us in the game,” said Steadman.
The win was sweet for the Spartans, who were upset in last year’s tournament final by English.
“Winning this tournament is always one of our top goals,” said St. Mary’s coach Mike D’Agostino.
“We came out and played really well for the first five or six minutes, and then didn’t really show up for a while,” D’Agostino said.
Connor Mackey was the MVP for the boys game for his defense against Classical’s Kevin Molina-Orelana.
“He really shut No. 9 (Molina-Orelana) down,” said D’Agostino.
“Yes,” said Steadman. “Once he switched to Kevin, that gave him a little less room to move around. He did a good job.”
In the consolation game, Lynn Tech defeated English, 7-1, with Geo Ramirez scoring four goals, with Ashby Murphy, Omer Pojoy and Edison Alas getting one apiece.
Teo Feliciano led the team on defense.
“We played up to our potential,” said coach Jeremy McKeen.