Suffield Boys Win On Own Goal From Somers

It wasn’t pretty, but it’s a win and Suffield will take it.

The defeated host 1-0 on Monday on an own goal.

While both teams had opportunities to score, the deciding goal came with 18:24 left in the second half.

Somers defender Connor O’Grady got his head on a ball in the air, but unfortunately for the Spartans, it went the wrong way. Goalie Alex Geas and a couple other Spartans chased it but couldn’t get to it in time.

It turned out to be the game winner for Suffield, but this is a very rare mistake from a very solid defense.

“Those two boys, my center defender and my goalie, have been friends and playing together for 12 years and that’s the first time I’ve ever seen them make a mistake like that,” Somers coach John Pantuosco said. “Stuff like that happens in this game. It’s one goal, and if we don’t score a goal, we don’t win anyways. You can’t blame either of them, it’s just one of those bounces that bounces the wrong way for you.”

Suffield coach Mark Beigel told his team after the game that he will take the win, but that his team needs to keep working hard.

“We’ve been working on things,” he said. “We’re 4-0 but we’re hardly perfect. It’s the beginning of the season and we’ve had a good start, but we’ve been fortuitous and have taken advantage of some moments and so we’re the frontrunners now.”

After the goal, both teams had good scoring chances but neither converted on any shots.

With a little over five minutes remaining, Somers had a chance to knot the score but Suffield goalie Ben Woodhouse made a beautiful save, knocking the ball harmlessly away.

“He took one right off the corner,” Pantuosco said. “We were all watching it go right to the corner and he got a paw on it. That would have been the first goal of Nick Elia’s career. He made a big save.”

Geas also played well in goal – making four saves – keeping Suffield off the scoreboard.

“Our goalie was fabulous, he didn’t make a mistake,” Pantuosco said. “That was just a little miscommunication.”

Woodhouse and Eric Johnson split time in goal, each making two saves.

“Somers has some great players,” Beigel said. “They had some really good opportunities. Our goalie came up with some really great saves. We had two first time goalies splitting time. Both of them are carrying their respective weight.”

It was a very physical and hard fought game, something both coaches expected.

“Big time battle,” Beigel said. “These games are physical and intense games. Both teams fought hard.”

Pantuosco said that he feels the better team won the game.

“If we play them a couple more times, we might be the better team but they were today,” he said. “Not to say that we couldn’t have won that game, because we could have. We’ve played teams that are better than us before and beaten them but they got the one lucky bounce and they’re a very good team. Their defenders played extremely well.”

He also feels that Suffield is going to have a good season.

“They’re gonna go very far,” Pantuosco said. “They’re one of the best teams in the state. Without a doubt. I don’t care what size school you are, Suffield is one of the best teams in the state. And I’d like to think that we are too.”

Beigel credits his team’s conditioning with the success in this game and the season overall.

“These guys push themselves hard,” he said. “They’re well conditioned, they had plenty of minutes left in them to keep on going. I felt that was a factor in terms of us being able to hold onto the one goal lead.”

He continued, “The senior class is just driven and they came into preseason the best conditioned squad I’ve had in a long time coming into the season. I think at the beginning of the season, a lot of it does come down to conditioning, the games can go either way.”

Suffield hosts Canton at 7 p.m. on Tuesday.

“This was two undefeated teams, I know these guys have been thinking about this,” he said of the game against Somers. “It was canceled on Friday – there was a huge buildup for this game – so we have to avoid the letdown.”

Somers (3-1) travels to Granby on Wednesday for a 3:45 p.m. game.