Northampton advances over Braves
1
NORTHAMPTON - The suspense was gone five minutes into Tuesday night's game.
Northampton capitalized on a considerable speed advantage and took an early two-goal lead en route to a 4-1 win over Taconic in the quarterfinals of the Western Massachusetts Division 1 Tournament at David Wright Field.
The fourth-seeded Blue Devils (10-6-3) advanced to play the winner of tonight's quarterfinal game between No. 1 Ludlow (14-0-3) and No. 8 Chicopee Comp (10-6-2). The time and date of the game has yet to be announced.
No. 5 Taconic finished its season at 10-5-4.
"It's a senior-laden group," Northampton coach Mike Soucy said. "They made the tournament last year and they weren't happy with last year's result.
"It's a journey now," he added. "They wanted to continue their playing careers. There's a lot of emotion now and they used that emotion positively. That's what you look for."
Ellis Cooper put the Blue Devils on the board 2 minutes, 19 seconds into the game after he collected a pass from Mulugetta Fratkin about 35 yards from the goal. Cooper motored past one defender, moved around goalie Cory Wasnewsky, who came out to cut off the angle, and fired it into the open goal mouth.
Less than two minutes later, the Blue Devils struck again as Cooper set up Charlie Cronin, who lofted it over Wasnewsky to put Northampton up 2-0.
"The past two games we've struggled to get goals," Fratkin said. "So that was really big for us."
Soucy agreed.
"That was huge," Soucy said. "Anytime you can get up two goals in the first five minutes, it really sets the tone. We got them out of position, playing on their heels."
Fratkin stretched the lead to 3-0 with 1:10 left in the half. He beat a defender on the far left side of the field, took two steps and booted a perfect had low shot into the far right corner of the net.
Senior Chris Warton added to the Blue Devils' lead 12:23 into the second half. Jonathan Butler sent a perfect crossing pass to Warton, who one-touched it home from the doorstep to make the score 4-0.
Goaltender Jeff Powers made two saves for Northampton before giving way to Ben Weaver with 17:29 remaining.
Brian Addy of the Braves converted a Ryan Baker pass with 40 seconds left to prevent the shutout.
Wasnewsky stopped 12 shots.
"Northampton plays like we want to play," said Taconic coach Mark Wasnewsky. "That's a style we want to copy. Hopefully now that we've seen it, we can continue to improve."
While a game against Ludlow in the semifinals is not assured, the Blue Devils are not shying away from a potential meeting with the undefeated defending state champs.
"They won states last year. If we were to knock them out, that would be a like a dream," Fratkin said.
"You want to play the best. At some point its going to happen," Soucy said. "Ludlow has that extra attachment to them. They're the defending state champ and a perennial power.
"We feel like we didn't play good soccer the first time around" in a 5-2 loss to the Lions in Ludlow on Sept. 22. "The guys know what's at stake. They'll be excited for the challenge this time around and so will I."
Matt Vautour can be reached at mvautour@gazettenet.com.
