Sports

Southold ekes out win; Worysz goes down

GARRET MEADE PHOTO | Southold's Jack Dunne, left, tries to ward off Stony Brook's Jason Lee while maintaining possession of the ball.
GARRET MEADE PHOTO | Southold’s Jack Dunne, left, tries to ward off Stony Brook’s Jason Lee while maintaining possession of the ball.

FIRST SETTLERS 2, BEARS 1

Even though the Southold High School boys soccer team won its 10th game and overcame a deficit on the road, the First Settlers hardly were in a celebratory mood Monday afternoon.

They felt they had squandered way too many scoring opportunities in their 2-1 win over The Stony Brook School. They also worried about the condition of sophomore forward Joseph Worysz, who suffered a leg injury at the end of the Suffolk County League VIII encounter in Stony Brook.

Worysz played an important role for the First Settlers, setting up Drew Sacher’s goal, which proved to be the difference with 0.9 seconds remaining in the first half.

Southold (10-4, 7-2) walked off the field unsatisfied.

“We could have played a lot better,” Sacher said. “We were terrible in front of the goal. Missed way too many opportunities to score. It shouldn’t have been 2-1.

“It’s frustrating. It always stinks coming from behind, but we persevered and scored two goals. But it should have been a lot more.”

Southold coach Andrew Sadowski concurred.

“Very disappointed in our lack of scoring,” he said. “We created quite a few chances. Stony Brook played very well. They played very hard. I just don’t think we capitalized on the opportunities that we had. I thought Stony Brook’s goalkeeper was probably the best player on the field. He made some awesome saves. He was without a doubt outstanding.”

Sadowski was talking about Lewis Meitz, who kept the Bears (2-9, 2-6) in the game with his 8 saves.

As good as he was, Meitz was not perfect as he could not stop two balls from entering the net.

The hosts drew first blood, scoring with 15:34 remaining in the first half. Sophomore forward Rickie Rodriguez, who was a headache for the First Settlers, fired a shot that goalkeeper John Charles Funke knocked away. But Khendrick Beausoleil slotted home the rebound.

Southold equalized with 6:14 left in the half when Kenji Fujita scored. Stony Brook defender Mac Bohny tried to clear the ball out of the box, deflecting it off Fujita and into the net. Not the most beautiful goal he has scored.

“Definitely not,” Fujita said. “A goal’s a goal.”

Worysz demonstrated great vision on the game-winner. He had an opportunity to shoot on the right side, but decided to pass to Sacher, who scored from six yards.

“We work on those game situations continuously in practice and I’m glad that he just stuck to the game and crossed the ball like we worked on,” Sadowski said.

Sacher had no complaints. “I saw the ball coming in and I swung my leg at it, hoping it was going in. Luckily it did.”

Worysz was not as lucky.

Just as the final buzzer sounded, Rodriguez kicked Worysz just above the right knee. Worysz fell to the ground and laid there for about 10 minutes, receiving attention from Sadowski and others.

Worysz’s condition could not be immediately ascertained.

“We’ve got to check and see what’s going on with his knee,” Sadowski said. “He got hit in the upper thigh. His foot was planted because he was going to strike the ball. … We have to check and make sure that his knee is fine.”

Stony Brook coach Doug Parra, who made sure Rodriguez went back out to apologize to Worysz, asked his sophomore forward what happened.

“Coach, I got the ball,” Parra said Rodriguez told him.

“It’s unfortunate that these youngsters sometimes, even though they have the ball, they also have to keep their spikes down and that’s basically what happened,” Parra added. “The grass is getting a little moist now, so he claims that he slipped as he came into the player.”

The First Settlers have two weeks before the playoffs begin.

“We have a lot of work to do,” Sacher said. “We’ve just got to get back into shape. Like I said, we’ve got to capitalize on our chances a lot more.”

Asked what he learned, Fujita replied, “No team is going to give us a win. We’ve got to earn our win. We definitely got to start playing better collectively and take it into the playoffs.”

Fujita, however, was optimistic. He said, “By playoff time, I’m sure we’ll be fine.”