Herkimer men, MVCC women head to national soccer tournaments

Herkimer College will send its men's teams on the road while serving as the host for the women as the NJCAA's Division III national tournaments start Wednesday.

The Herkimer men are seeded second as the Region III-A champion behind defending national champion Dallas College-Richland for their eight-team tournament at Genesee Community College.

Mohawk Valley Community College will be the team with the local fans at the women's tournament on Herkimer's Wehrum Field. Mohawk Valley's unbeaten women are seeded third for a tournament with defending champion Dallas College-Brookhaven, the winner of two of the last three national championships, and Michigan's Delta College, the runner-up twice to Brookhaven and the winner over Brookhaven in the spring season contested in between, seeded ahead of the Hawks.

The tournaments have swapped sites from last fall when the women played in Batavia. The men's tournament had been played in Herkimer every season since 2009.

Play begins at 11 a.m. Wednesday at both sites with semifinals Friday and championship matches Sunday at 1 p.m. Wednesday's losing teams will play consolation matches Thursday.

Women's soccer: Mohawk Valley vs Rowan College South Jersey

The NJCAA women head to Herkimer for the first time since 2009. Richland won the title that year at a four-team tournament with Mohawk Valley finishing third.

Unbeaten and untied Mohawk Valley (14-0-0) makes the short trip from Utica with a group of players whose family, friends and high school teammates and coaches will also have short trips to cheer them on. Twelve of the 23 players on the Mohawk Valley roster played at Center State Conference high schools and five at Tri-Valley League schools. Region III tournament most valuable player Jazmyn Gillette is a Central Valley Academy graduate, tournament all-stars Alexis Bates and Amber Piersma are freshmen from Poland and Mt. Markham, respectively, while Kylee Rickard is a sophomore who played just across the Section II boundary at Canajoharie.

More:Local high school standouts hitting field at NJCAA women's soccer tournament

Piersma (26 goals-17 assists), Gillette (22-17), Bates (16-13), Alyssa Shepherd (12-4), a freshman from Sauquoit Valley, and Jordyn Squire (6-11), a sophomore from Poland, are the leading scorers while goalie Hannah Pcola, another freshman from Mt. Markham, has allowed two goals in 12 starts.

The Hawks earned their Region III title with an 11-1 rout of Finger Lakes Community College.

Mohawk Valley will play the final quarterfinal Wednesday, scheduled for a 6:30 p.m. start against Rowan College of South Jersey-Gloucester (10-5-0), the No. 6 seed. Play starts with Brookhaven (13-0-1) and Maryland's Anne Arundel Community College (5-7-0) at 11 a.m. Genesee Community College (10-3-1) the second Region III entry and No. 4 seed, plays at 1:30 p.m. against New Jersey's Ocean County College (8-2-0), and Delta (14-1-2) plays Bristol Community College (10-4-0) from Massachusetts at 4 p.m.

Brookhaven beat Mohawk Valley 3-1 in last fall's semifinals. Delta had beaten Mohawk Valley 5-1 in the semifinals in the spring in Cranford, New Jersey.

Brookhaven was a 2-1 winner in last year's title match.

Mohawk Valley is a two-time champion. The Hawks last won 10 years ago at Tompkins Community College and won their first title in Herkimer in 2003.

The women last played their tournament in Herkimer in 2009. Wehrum Stadium was scheduled as the site for the 2020 tournament before the coronavirus pandemic delayed the season to the spring semester and the sites were changed.

Men's soccer: Herkimer vs. Raritan Valley Community College

Richland defeated Herkimer 3-0 last fall in the two schools' fifth meeting in a national championship match. The schools are seeded 1-2 this year for the fourth time in 10 years with matching 13-0-1 records.

Herkimer returns to the tournament with 2021 All-America Ali Somow, a local kid who graduated from Utica's Thomas R. Proctor High School and the Generals' leading scorer with 11 goals and seven assists. Somow had two goals and two assists in Herkimer's 6-0 shutout Jefferson Community College while goalies Cathal Carney, a freshman from Springfield, Massachusetts, and Jon Bovair, a sophomore from Canastota each played a half and made two saves.

The Generals won their regional title by beating Onondaga Community College 3-1 on the eve of Halloween at Tompkins Cortland. Carney made three saves as Onondaga scored only the second goal against Herkimer this season. Nichlas Kamfjord, a sophomore from Norway - the country, not the Herkimer County town - scored two of the goals while classmate Yamato Fujishima had two assists and freshman Shuntaro Morimoto, his countryman from Japan, scored the other goal.

Kamfjord (8 goals-4 assists), Fujishima (7-9) and Morimoto (6-3) are among 17 international Generals and the next three leading scorers after Somow.

Carney had not allowed a goal prior to the regional final. He played a scoreless overtime tie against the Mohawk Valley men, and shut out Ulster Community College in a match the Generals won 1-0 on Somow's golden goal in the 109th minute.

The Generals will play at 4 p.m. Wednesday against New Jersey's Raritan Valley Community College (11-3-1), the seventh seed. Richland meets No. 8 Community College of Rhode Island (7-6-1) at 11 a.m. to start the day, and the 1:30 p.m. match will be No. 4 Camden County College (13-2-0) from New Jersey against No. 5 Suffolk County Community College (14-2-0) from Long Island. Genesee (13-3-2), the other Region III entry and No. 3 seed, plays the 6:30 p.m. nightcap on its home field against No. 6 Anne Arundel (11-4-0).

Should they hold seed in the quarterfinals, Herkimer and Genesee would meet in Friday's second semifinal. The Generals were 2-0 winners when the teams played in Herkimer Oct. 5.

This article originally appeared on Times Telegram: Herkimer men, MVCC women head to NJCAA Division III soccer tournaments