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Broncos overcome slow start to edge BG, 3-2

By Tom King - Staff Writer | Sep 27, 2018

Staff photo by TOM KING Alvirne's Jake Caires (20) goes airborne to deflect the ball away from Bishop Guertin's Trent Porcelli during the Broncos' 3-2 win Wednesday in Hudson.

HUDSON – In a span of 24 hours, the Alvirne High School boys soccer team had been outscored 9-1.

They were winless, and against the strong wind on Wednesday, already trailing Bishop Guertin 1-0. Every reason to pack it up after you’ve packed it in. All the ingredients were there.

But in high school sports you never know, right? The Broncos got the equalizer in the first half, and scored twice in the second for a 3-2 win over the Cards, giving first year head coach Marcos Vieira Filho his first career varsity victory.

“I tell them every time we get scored on, comeback wins feel that much nicer, you know?” Vieira Filho said. “It’s never worth the wait but it 100 percent feels good. I’m glad our progress is starting to show on the field.”

What was different for the now 1-8 Broncos, who had a lost journey to Hanover on Tuesday to lose 8-1 in the pouring rain?

“I don’t think it was anything different,” Bronco leader Nick Cardenas said. “We’ve been pushing hard all season, it finally came up for us. … Honestly, it’s just great.”

After Guertin (2-6-1) had taken a 1-0 lead nearly four minutes in on a goal by Victor Martinez Gayaree, it looked like the same old, same old for Alvirne, which had started the season 0-8. Guertin coach Valdemir “Rocky” Roque had a strong wind in his favor, and was sending three players.

It didn’t work.

“In the first 15 minutes we played very well, but after that we couldn’t hold the formation and play as a team,” said , who is trying to rebuild the Cards. “And we lost our energy. Unfortunately today wasn’t our day.”

The Broncos tied it when Cardenas, off an Alex Clark feed, slid one past Guertin first half goalie Ryan Blow (four stops) at 23:11 of the first half and it remained 1-1 to halftime.

The Cards’ Michael Poulbon was in the net in the second half and the Broncos put a ton of pressure on him right away. He ended up with six saves, but on a bang-bang play, Alvirne’s Jackson Romalinho put in a rebound of a Jack Ashworth shot that Poulbon was helpless to stop as he watched it trickle in at 60:19 for a 2-1 Bronco lead.

It got worse as just inside of five minutes to go, Jake Dufour streaked down left wing, moved in and instead of shooting slid it past an overcommitted Poulbon found Cardenas who tapped it into an empty net for a 3-1 lead.

Guertin got that one back as Trent Porcelli converted Martinez Gayaree’s corner kick to make it 3-2 at 76:23. But Roque certainly didn’t think it would be over 70 minutes between goals, and it was too little, too late. Alvirne keeper Mason Brooks (six saves) had something to do with that.

“Exactly, we wanted to score more goals in the first half and secure the game,” Roque said. “That was the idea, but they didn’t respond.”

Vieira Filho talked to his team before the game about a “playoff push”, unusual goal for a winless team, but he hit the right button – and for a reason.

“Oh yeah 100 percent,” Vieira Filho said. “They know that these next couple of games are important. We didn’t have a solid record to start off, but we had a tough schedule to start off. Now that schedule gets to help us out a little bit, we get to hopefully capitalize on some important wins.”

Nothing more important, though, than that first one.

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