90th Minute Goal Gives Boys’ Soccer the 1-0 Victory

This past Saturday, Big Red’s varsity soccer team defeated Beaver Country Day School’s varsity squad 1-0. Although Exeter prevailed, the game was a close match that surprised the team.

“Beaver Country Day was a quality opponent,” head coach AJ Cosgrove said. “They were a technical team with a couple of very dangerous players. They did a good job of defending and staying behind the ball the entire game.”

Cosgrove noted, however, that Big Red’s soccer did not grant the opponents take control of the possession of the ball.

“We won the possession battle. We played well. We only allowed one shot on goal all game and another that was a missed kick from our defender.  We possessed and defended extremely well,” Cosgrove said.

Senior and co-captain Ted Hart said that although the team performed well, Beaver Country Day proved to be an unexpectedly challenging opponent.

“We have won each of our last three games by one goal, so we're used to playing in tight games, but this game was different in that it took us 90 minutes to break the tie,” Hart said. “Defensively we didn't give them many chances, so I never thought we were in trouble of losing the game. Although, we had a hard time finishing our chances, and it became frustrating since every win is crucial at this point of the season.”

Hart continued. “We knew very little about Beaver Country going into the game, so we were caught off guard when we realized they were a talented team who could play with us. They were strong up the middle of the field and they didn't give us any uncontested shots on goal.”

Although both teams fought throughout the entire game—the entire 90 minutes of it—to score a goal, the winner of the first and the last goal of the game turned out to be Exeter. Seconds before the final whistle, upper Trevor Cosgrove shot the ball into the net, and the game concluded.

“Quintin Distefano dumped the ball in the box, and a mad scramble ensued.  Ted Hart got a piece of it, Trevor Cosgrove deflected it, Collin Shapiro shot it, and then Trevor picked up the deflection and scored the goal,” Cosgrove said.

Lower Quintin DiStefano emphasized the unique nature of Cosgrove’s goal.

“With just a single second left on the clock, he tapped it in from just feet from the net. You never really hear about buzzer-beaters in soccer, but this was one for sure,” DiStefano said.

Senior Max Rerkpattanapipat said that with the victory against Beaver Country Day, the team will prepare for the upcoming tournament and the match against Andover this weekend.

"The team this year wants it bad, everyone can tell, and we can all sense it"

“It was clutch and a huge win for us. It wasn't pretty, but a win is a win, and now we're onto the toughest and most important week of the season so far with KUA on Wednesday and Andover on Saturday. The team this year wants it bad, everyone can tell, and we can all sense it,” Rerkpattanapipat said. “We want to go storming into that tournament and play our hearts out.”