Sports Editor
ROCKPORT — The playoff road came to an end for the Caribou boys soccer team Wednesday as the No. 5 Vikings (6-6-3 overall) fell prey to No. 4 Camden Hills 6-1 in an Eastern Class B quarterfinal game played at Camden Hills Regional High School.
Staff photo/Joseph CyrMaking a valiant attempt to stop the ball is Caribou goalie Stephen St. Peter during Wednesday’s quarterfinal loss in Camden Hills.
Camden Hills (13-3 overall) went on to lose Saturday to No. 1 Ellsworth 1-0 in the semifinals.
After a nearly five-hour bus ride, one might have suspected that Caribou would be flat in the first-half of Wednesday’s game. In fact, it was just the opposite as Caribou had a sensational first half, holding pace with high-powered Camden Hills.
Coming into the game, Caribou coach Mark Shea knew his team would need to score to keep pace with the Windjammers. After all, Camden Hills tallied 68 regular-season goals, while allowing just nine. Caribou, which ended its season with a three-game skid, scored 36 goals in the regular season and allowed 27.
Trailing just 2-1 at halftime, the Vikings watched Camden Hills get four second-half goals to break open the game. Windjammer Jimmy Weferling had two goals and two assists, while Sam Predham added two goals and one assist. Max Twaddel and Andy Stevick each had solo goals while Zach Nelson, and Andrew Flanagan each had one assist.
Cameron Anderson scored the lone Viking goal, with an assist by Roland Thibodeau.
Camden Hills held a 30-6 advantage in shots and a 6-1 edge in corner kicks. Caribou goalie Stephen St. Pierre had seven saves, while Windjammer goalie Ian Cushing stopped four shots.
Twaddel opened the game’s scoring with 35:36 remaining in the first half off a corner kick by Wefereling. Caribou answered quickly as Anderson converted a feed from Thibodeau 1:30 later to knot the game at 1-1.
Weferling scored his first of two goals with 32:51 to play in the first half off a pass from Predham to make it 2-1 going into the break.
“In a 2-1 game, whoever gets that next goal is really important,” Windjammer coach Mike Grey said. “And we talked about that at halftime. If we make it 3-1, we take the wind out of their sails. [If] they make it 2-2, the battle is on so that [penalty kick] was really important.”
The penalty kick coach Grey was referring to, came midway through the second half, when the referee ruled that Stevick was pushed in the scoring box by a Viking defender and was awarded penalty kick. Stevick answered the challenge and buried his shot past St. Peter for what proved be the eventual game-winner.
“The penalty kick was the main difference,” coach Shea said. “That changed the momentum. We were hanging in there to that point and we hung with one of the strongest teams [in Eastern Class B] by far today. Once they got rolling, they didn’t stop.”
From there, things began to unravel for the Vikes as Camden Hills went on a scoring rampage.
“I told the guys I’d had enough of it and that they should have had enough of it too,” Grey said of his team’s lack of scoring in the first half. “[Caribou’s] a good team and a dangerous team that was getting good opportunities. We’ve got to want to play a full 40-minute half and you can’t take plays off. And in the second half, nobody did and that was the difference.”
Staff photo/Joseph Cyr
Caribou’s Chad Caverhill, right, watches as Camden Hills’ Malcolm Steele soars high into the air to head the ball.
“We just didn’t have enough horses for the race we were in,” Shea said. “For me, the most important thing to note is that the game was much closer than the score indicates. We gave up a sort of soft goal in the first five minutes, then answered with a goal of our own almost immediately. Unfortunately for us, Camden answered back with a superb goal off a corner kick a short time later.”
Shea added the Vikings then settled into their game plan of putting lots of players behind the ball, and trying to counterattack by playing the ball long whenever possible.
“I felt like we were not only containing a great team, but that we were creating some scoring opportunities of our own,” Shea said. “We entered the second half with the wind at our backs and a lot of confidence. An ill-timed penalty kick call gave Camden an insurance goal, and more importantly, swung the confidence factor back in their favor. It was at that point, I think, that Camden began to play up to their potential, rather than we all of a sudden began to play poorly.”
