Crowd of 2,000 enjoys two cliffhangers as part of Soccer Night in Cherry Hill
CHERRY HILL – The highlights lived up to the spotlight.
An estimated 2,000 people filled Jonas C. Morris Stadium Saturday to mark the fourth annual Soccer Night in Cherry Hill, and the boys and girls soccer teams from Cherry Hill High School East and Cherry Hill West gave them a show to remember.
The East girls team rallied from a goal back to score its first win at the event, 2-1. The Cougars' boys squad battled to a scoreless draw with Cherry Hill West, the 12th ranked team in the South Jersey Mean 15.
There was also a flyover as the national anthem was played before the boys' game. A flock of geese passed above the players in formation right at “rockets red glare.”
It was probably the hardest part of the night to arrange.
“One of our coaches just said hey, why don't we do this with the youth programs,” district athletic director Mike Beirao said. “It was easy to put together, and we worked with Cherry Hill FC, and we thought it's just a great way to bring everybody together.”
The high school teams were walked out on the field by youth players, who also got a little training in on the turf between games.
These are interdivisional games in the Olympic Conference. The schedule calls for East and West to meet just once a year. So why not build an event around it?
“When I got here, one of the goals was to build a culture of excitement for our community – something where we could rally as a community – both East and West – and bring everybody together. I think one of the things you learn about Cherry Hill is that every kid, at one point or another when they're young, plays soccer. So it was a way to bring together our high school teams, our middle school teams, the community teams, and really just put on a showcase event for everyone.”
The Cherry Hill West girls (4-4) dominated the show in the early going. Reilly McGlinn touched Julie Short's long overhead pass over Cougars' goalkeeper Madison Schultz in the 35th minute, but it was Schultz, early in the second half, who changed the course of the game.
A penalty put McGlinn on the spot with a chance to give the Lions a 2-0 lead, but Schultz dived to her right and palmed away the shot.
“Most of the time you can see it in their eyes,” Schultz said. “She was looking at the right corner the whole time. You just kind of have to guess where they're going, and when I saw her body position, I knew she was going that way for sure. It was exactly what we needed to bring the team up.”
It was.
Lizzie Sommeling equalized for the Cougars (3-5) about six minutes later, and five minutes after that, a through ball by Julia Maher launched freshman Kira Fowler in on a breakaway that resulted in the go-ahead goal.
“It's exactly what we've been going over and over every single week in practice, and it finally showed,” Cherry Hill East coach Rachel Steelman-Tonon said. “The drive to just win is finally there. It was something that we've struggled with throughout the season and it was finally there. I'm just so proud of the girls.”
The Cougars' boys team came out with something to prove, at 4-2. They'd beaten the teams they were supposed to beat, but lost to ranked opponents Shawnee and Cherokee.
But the Lions had a statement to make too. Cherry Hill East's Adam Blumenthal bounced a Cougars' chance off the woodwork in the early going. Cherry Hill West keeper Leo Orefice brought East's other challenges to a frustrating end.
Orefice dived to this right to stop a low try at the left post from Eitan Volodarski, only to have Alec Herring collect the rebound as he trailed the play. Orefice got to his feet and dived hard to his left to make a second save.
“We're just dogs out here,” Orefice said. “We're fighting, we're working – they beat us last year and we came back hungry this year. We didn't get one, but we worked really hard. Just a hard-fought game on both sides.”
Which is the whole point.
“When you're the AD at both schools, you just want to see two really competitive games,” Beirao said. “The outcome, to me, doesn't matter to much. Both teams used this as a springboard to move on to the playoffs and do some great things last year.”
There's no reason to think it won't happen again.
The Cougars' boys are just a little impatient for it.
“I do look at it as a missed opportunity,” Cherry Hill East assistant coach John Aiello said. “There are some people that don't believe in us yet, and we're going to show them. We've got a tough week coming up, with (Rancocas Valley) and West Deptford. We're going to have to try and take care of business. We'll see what happens.”
This article originally appeared on Burlington County Times: Cherry Hill East and West squads put on show for Soccer Night
