Pires Powers Mustangs to Opening Round Win

If Medford's previous two games against Everett were any indicator of how Saturday's preliminary round match against the Crimson Tide would turn out, then Medford fans could definitely count on a nail-biter. 

Sure enough, both teams failed to disappoint, as the ninth-seeded Mustangs got a pair of goals from senior captain David Pires to beat 24th-seeded Everett, 2-1, to advance to the first round of the Div. 1 North Sectional. 

"Oh my goodness, it's always tough against Everett, every time we play them," said head coach Mike Petrides. "Playing them three times in one year it's the toughest thing to come up with a win against them. They've got some kids that can actually score. I was kind of shocked that it was a low-scoring game, but our defense held."

Medford (11-2-5) shutout Everett (7-7-3) in its two regular season matches, but on Saturday, both teams scored early, with Pires knocking in a free kick from Emmanuel Gonzalez to give the Mustangs a 1-0 lead at the 37 minute mark. 

Just six minutes later, Everett tied it up on a perfectly-placed direct kick. That would be all the scoring either team would see until the end of the match, with both the Mustang and Crimson Tide defenses clamping down.

But it wasn't for a lack of trying offensively, as both teams racked up close to 40 shots in a fast-paced and physical game that kept up its frantic pace until the very end. 

"Tough defense," said Petrides. "If you look at their record, you can see that they've been scoring, three goals, four goals.... the whole year. We held them 2-0 here and 1-0 at their field, so that's the key. The key is defense, that's the bottom line here."

"One of our captains, Rico Altema, he was a little all over the place," said Petrides. "but he settled down and he took control of the defense."

At around the 33 minute mark in the second half, the Mustangs had their best chance to take the lead on four consecutive corner kicks, but Everett somehow managed to keep Medford off the board. 

Finally at the 6:50 mark, Pires knocked in the game-winner off of a free kick by Matheus Anastacio, who was awarded the ball after Gonzalez was carried off the field with a knee injury when he was tripped by an Everett player. 

"David (Pires) is an opportunist," said Petrides. "All year long we've been telling him that. The system that we play in, he plays by himself. He has to check and do a lot of work and we harp on him a lot, but he really does do his work. That's his job, he has to score goals and that's exactly what he did." 

"I'm a little disappointed that we lost the kid in the middle, Manny Gonzalez," added Petrides. "He's a big kid in our midfield so we'll have to just make do and see what we can do. We gotta make some adjustments now..."

Medford will have to wait and see who wins today's game between eighth-seeded Brighton (11-3-1) and Billerica (8-8-2), the 25th seed. If Billerica can upset Brighton, then Medford will get to host its second straight tournament game.