A Great Run Ends

Late Holt goal ends Salem's magical
run at Division 1 state soccer title

  With a black knit cap pulled snugly around his ears, Holt goal-keeper J.T. McCaige resembled a thief in the night during Wednesday's Division 1 semifinal soccer match against Salem.

  McCaige's appearance proved to be fitting after he cold-bloodedly stole a final-game berth from the Rocks.

  With 5:50 to play -- and just 39 seconds after Ben Gates had connected on a well-placed header to give Holt a 1-0 lead -- Salem's Alex Tramel motored down the right flank and ripped a low hummer that appeared headed for the lower-left corner of the net.

  But the cat-quick McCaige somehow smothered the rocket while diving to his right.

  "I knew they were going to come out hard once we scored, I knew it was going to get tougher," said McCaige, who has registered 17 consecutive shutouts for the 26-0-1 Rams. "I just made sure I watched the ball and I didn't take my eye off it. It was a pretty predictable shot."

  Thirteen minutes earlier, with the match scoreless, McCaige saved the day again for the Rams when he denied Lachlan Savage's point-blank blast with a one-handed, Spiderman-like save.

  "We knew he had a number of shutouts coming into this game, but we didn't know he was this good," Salem coach Ed McCarthy said of McCaige. "We was outstanding, clearly the best player on the field tonight. He was the difference."

  Salem, which finished 17-5-4, carried the possession by at least a 60-40 margin for most of the contest. But the Rocks couldn't finish against the small but agile McCaige.

  "We didn't have a lot of scoring opportunities, but I thought we had enough to get at least one in tonight," said McCarthy. "I was very happy with how we played. I thought we defended very well."

  The game's lone goal was recorded with 6:29 to play when Gates threaded Jordan Lewis's looping cross into the upper-most right corner of the goal, setting off a crazy-happy outburst in front of the Rams' bench.

  "It was one of those one-in-a-million headers," said McCarthy. "It wasn't like it was a well-driven ball, but was well-placed and a difficult ball to defend."

  The pivotal save of the first half belonged to Salem's Sasa Miskovic, who skied high to bat away a missile launched by Gates.

  The Rocks nearly took a 1-0 advantage into the intermission, but Dan Martin's well-struck ball from 18 yards out sailed a foot high of the cross-bar.

  Salem barely misfired on a series of opportunities in the second half. With 35:20 left, Scott O'Connor slid a slick pass to Tramel, whose one-timer drifted wide right.

  Thirteen minutes later Tramel connected with Evan Antich, whose 15-yard bullet missed the goal by a few feet.

  As the Rams celebrated just a few yards away, McCarthy reflected on his team's second consecutive stellar season.

  "It's always hard at this moment to reflect back on the season, but we had an outstanding season," the veteran coach said. "We had a tremendous post-season run and we played well tonight.

  "Even though we lost tonight, I wasn't disappointed at all with our effort."

 
  Ed Wright can be reached at info@plymouthcantonsports.com or (734) 453-1980.