Plymouth North Boys Soccer Win State Opener In 2 OT

Plymouth North's Connor Follette scored his second goal of the afternoon, for a 2-1 North victory in the 2011 Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association Boys Soccer South Division 2 preliminary round match.

The first state tournament match in three years ended two minutes into a second 10-minute overtime period here Saturday.

Sharon had tied the score at 1-1 with five minutes left in regulation, on sophomore Will Ginsberg's goal, assisted by junior Ian Beach.

The Eagles finished the regular season at 6-6-5. Sharon was seeded 15th in the 21-team tourney.

Plymouth North (18th seed, 8-8-2 regular season) plays at No. 2-seed Hopkinton in a first-round match at 7 p.m. Monday. Monday night's winner plays the winner of Sunday's first rounder between No. 10 Bishop Feehan (9-6-3) and host No. 7 Martha's Vineyard (10-4-2) in the quarterfinals Wednesday.

Hopkinton, Feehan and Martha's Vineyard received preliminary-round byes.

"I know they (Hopkinton) are really, really good. They've been really good for three years. So, we're going to have to pull something out special," Plymouth North head coach Bill Farrell said.

Saturday, Follette's first goal was a header off a corner kick from Ryan Moskos. Sharon senior goalkeeper and captain Mitchell Goldenberg leaped, but couldn't snag it.

Sharon spent much of the second half pelting Plymouth North goalkeeper Brian Christian with shots.

Only Ginsberg connected.

"That was a big goal," Sharon head coach Barry Kaye said.

"The guys never quit. I thought we had the momentum. Even when we went to overtime, you never know with penalty kicks. That's a 50-50 thing, too. We were hoping to win it. But they played hard, and I'm proud of them."

Neither team scored in the first 10-minute overtime.

Two minutes into the second one, Follette shot from about 45 yards out, and into the Sharon goal's top left corner, the game-winning goal.

"My assistant coach said to him, 'First thing you do, get a shot on goal, just to get us picked up,'" Farrell said.

"This is my 22nd trip to the tournament, and I've never had a game end on one of these."

Kaye said Sharon took so many shots that "we could've had three or four goals. So, we can't be too upset."

"The only thing that hurts is that it was winnable. The game was winnable," Kaye said.

"That's probably what hurts more than anything. But, that's the game of soccer. You can out-play them the whole game and out-shoot them, but the final score is what counts."