The Whaler boys soccer team has been itching to get back on the patch since their 1-0 loss on Tuesday to Sturgis East. Head coach Rich Brannigan II challenged his players to get off to a quick start in a bounce back game against the Falmouth Clippers on Thursday, and they did just that scoring three first half goals on their way to a 3-2 victory.
“It was good to get out of the gate early and I put out that challenge to the guys that this was a rebound game and I wanted to see how they would respond,” he said. “They knew they didn’t play up to their capabilities on Tuesday and responded with a very dominant first half.”
Pajorn Drysdale, Yeison Castro, and Alejandro Chacon were the Whaler goal scorers. Treyce Brannigan had an assist and David Lemus-Castro had a pair of assists.
“It was great to have three different goal scorers and show off that depth a little bit,” Brannigan said. “Jose Aguilar had a great game in the midfield. I thought Treyce played well too. Defensively they did their job. Falmouth scored on a corner kick for their first goal and then they scored another with only four minutes left. Overall we did what we had to do to hold them off and get the win.”
The Whalers will travel to take on Archbishop Williams on Saturday at 3 pm.
In other Whaler sports news from Thursday,
Girls Soccer Ties Falmouth 0-0
The Whaler girls soccer team tied their second straight game Thursday afternoon against the Falmouth Clippers 0-0. Goalie Macy Crowell had an excellent game with 24 saves. Head coach Brian King continues to be pleased with the growth of his young team.
“This was a fast, physical back and forth game,” he said. “Both teams had opportunities to score. Our back line, center backs Caroline Correia and Sarah Hanlon, outside backs Ava Mosscrop and Claire Misurelli played especially well. They were under fire often and when Falmouth was able to get by them Macy stood on her head and made save after save. She showed why she is the best keeper in the league.”
Crowell’s best save came in the first half when she dove to her left and got just enough of the ball to poke it out of play while in a full extension. The Whalers were missing four starters in this game, but King said he felt like Lauren Cutone and Lydia Johnson stepped up and played a solid game to secure the tie.
The Whalers will travel to take on Archbishop Williams on Saturday at 1 pm.
Volleyball Loses 3-2 To Sturgis West
The Whaler volleyball team came up short in their match against Sturgis West on Thursday, losing 3-2 against league rival Sturgis West.
“It was a great challenge for us and allowed us to see some of the areas of our game where we need to improve ahead of the tournament,” head coach Andrew Viselli said. “It was a tough loss and we had a
lot of hitting and serving errors that really hurt us. All of the errors we suffered are kids trying to do too much. They really want to win and played hard. I have no complaints about these kids.”
The sets were as followed:
Set One: 23-25 Sturgis West
Set Two: 26-24 Nantucket
Set Three: 20-25 Sturgis West
Set Four: 25-14 Nantucket
Set Five: 13-15 Sturgis West
Setter Bianca Santos had 30 assists and outside hitter Kacey Riseborough had 22 kills. The Whalers will look to get back in the win column and improve to 9-5 this season when they travel to Falmouth to take on the Clippers on Friday at 5 pm.
Field Hockey Drops Another To Monomoy
The Whaler field hockey team lost 4-0 to the Monomoy Sharks Thursday afternoon. The Whalers were loose on defense in the first half, which allowed for the Sharks to get some A-quality chances and take a 3-0 lead going into halftime.
“It is back to back games here where I thought we played really well against some quality teams,” head coach Dan Weber said. “I thought we played a bit better on Tuesday but even today I never thought we looked out of place. I felt like we had periods of long, sustained pressure. I think we had chances today we just didn’t finish them. When we are in games like this against a team like Monomoy we need to finish these chances and put them in the back of the net.”
The Whalers let up another early in the second half. Weber said his team needs to be better at slowing down counter attacks.
“On a couple of those goals Monomoy scored they came off our pressure on the counter attack,” he said. “We just need to be better at stopping that. We can’t get beat beat clean. Slow them down by a foul or something. We had those lapses but we can work on it and get better from this.”
The Whalers will look to bounce back on Saturday when they travel to take on St. John Paul II at 9:30 am.
