Senior Anthony Buoscio said, “I was just in the right place at the right time.” That appeared to be a defining theme for Westfield on Saturday night.
After the girls soccer team won its county final, the boys used their 20 minutes of warmups to the best of their abilities. The boys perhaps faced some added pressure because the Westfield girls varsity, boys JV and girls JV teams had already played and won their county title games. But the Blue Devils stayed calm and collected and focused on the task at hand.
Early in the second half, junior Derek Azevedo attempted a shot on goal, but it deflected off of an Elizabeth defender’s hand. After a delayed reaction from the sideline official, and much discussion with the center referee, the play was ultimately deemed a handball inside of the 18-yard box and the Blue Devils were granted a penalty kick.
Senior captain Noah Fischer walked to the mark and placed the ball down with confidence. He took a few steps back, heard the whistle blow, and pounced on the stationary ball. But, his shot was too central, and the Elizabeth goalkeeper saved it. The play didn’t stop there. The ball rebounded off the keeper and remained in play. Buoscio capitalized on the deflected shot and passed the ball into the back of the net. The senior joked around after the game, saying, “I think Noah saw me behind him and missed on purpose so I could get a tap in.”
With Westfield now leading 1-0, the Blue Devils’ defensive line had to step up once again. The solid group of boys have stayed strong the whole season, including in this game. Fischer said, “Communication between me, Korn and Liebs is where it starts.” The first half consisted of a constant back and forth battle between Westfield and Elizabeth. Senior goalkeeper Michael Liebermann finished off the game with 3 saves after the defense deflected most of Elizabeth’s shots.
Many times in this matchup, an Elizabeth player would step up around the edge of the 18-yard box, rip a shot, and a Blue Devil defender would deflect it perfectly out of the box. Similar to the semifinal game played last Saturday, the defense was a brick wall. Nothing was getting through it, and if it did, Liebermann was there to stop it.
Elizabeth pelted shots that were easily denied by seniors Mike Blake, Drew Kornfeld and Brendan Percival. Fischer said, “We came up with a lot of deflections. We blocked a lot of the shots that came from Elizabeth and the defense just propelled their offense. That was really what it was all about tonight.”
Elizabeth’s skill matched well with Westfield, but their aggression was over the top. Elizabeth players were given many yellow cards, and on top of that, they overreacted with injuries after they came studs up on the Blue Devils.
Despite this, the coaches stayed calm, and besides a dispute during halftime, the coaches remained respectful while still sticking up for their players. After an Elizabeth player went down with what seemed to be a cramp, assistant coach Demont Heard even joked around with his defense, saying “Easy, he’s got a cramp.”
Though the defense was strong, the forward line found trouble finishing chances and keeping the ball in the final third of the field. Despite the difficulty of the forward line, head coach Eric Shaw was still proud of his team. He said, “We showed great character and resilience. We had the will to win, never gave up and we were organized defensively.”
This was the second time Westfield has beaten Elizabeth this season. The first win, which came on the first day of the season, was Westfield’s first time defeating Elizabeth since 2017. This game was also Westfield’s 6th consecutive clean sheet and 11th of the season.
“After this game, I’m really excited and looking forward to states,” Fischer said. “This win gave us a lot of momentum we are going to use through the state tournament.”
