Wantagh Boys Soccer Stuns Garden City on Last Minute Goal

Wantagh boys soccer coach Tom Ligouri went with his hunch and it could not have worked out any better.

With the score knotted 2-2 in the final minute of regulation, a Garden City defensive foul gave the Warriors a free kick from about 15 yards away from the goal on the left wing side. Alec Chapoteau was originally going to take the kick, but Ligouri had Matt Vaccaro do it instead.

“I just had a feeling about the kid I said to take it, Matt Vaccaro,” Ligouri said. “It looked like one of the other kids was lining up to take it. I just had a feeling just from the position of where the ball was. He was sending some beautiful balls in the box and I just had a hunch.”

Vaccaro perfectly arced the ball towards the right side of the goal box towards teammate Chris Iannetta, who headed it in with 31 seconds left to give Wantagh the stunning road victory over the Trojans on Friday.

“I just looked at it like we had no more time left,” Iannetta said. “I had to do something so I went in for it and I got the right shot and it just went right in. He gave me the perfect chip.”

Garden City, who got two goals from Christopher Skorr in the game’s first 24 minutes, lost for the first time in four tries (3-1 overall, 1-1 in Conference IV-A).

“It’s frustrating, (but) it’s early in the season,” Trojans coach Carlo Mazarese said. “Hopefully we will learn something. We had our chances in the first half. I think we should have put them away in the first half. If we score on those opportunities, it wouldn’t be close.”

Skorr opened the scoring at 11:35 of the first half on a play very similar to Iannetta’s. Backliner Ted Spanos sent a long free kick from his own end towards the right side of the goalie box, which Skorr redirected with his head for his third goal of the season. Just over 12 minutes later, he beat Wantagh goalie Kevin Laibach with a shot that just snuck inside the left post.

“There were two lapses and credit Garden City on those two goals,” Ligouri said. “We sort of fell asleep. There were some spots where we were on our heels defensively.”

Garden City, who came into the contest with 15 goals in three games, had three shots hit either the crossbar or post in the first half, including two by leading scorer Sean Bingham.

“It was pretty frustrating,” Bingham said. “We got unlucky.”

Wantagh (2-2, 1-1) took advantage of its good fortune and finally got on the board with 7:16 left in the first half when Patrick Quigley’s arcing shot from the right side sailed over Trojans goalie James Pyatsky.

The rejuvenated Warriors then tied it 88 seconds later on Chapoteau’s tally. Joe O’Halloran controlled a loose ball and chipped a pass to Chapoteau, who muscled around Spanos and beat Pyatsky with a shot to the lower right side of the goal.

Both teams played much better defense in the second half, which featured mostly crossing passes that were either blocked or sailed across to the other side of the field untouched. Wantagh thought it had scored with 28:25 left, but an apparent tally by Quigly from in-close was nullified because of an offsides violation.

Garden City nearly scored with two minutes left, but a shot from the right side of the box was stopped by Laibach. Both goalies had five saves in the game.

Wantagh is next in action on Tuesday at home against South Side, who the Warriors fell to in last . Kickoff at is at 4:30 p.m.

Download the movie