Evan almighty

Energizer Antich's second-half goal pushes Salem into District final match

  Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang. Woooosh!

  Those were a few of the significant sounds the Salem soccer team's attack produced against Northville Wednesday night in a thrill-a-minute Division 1 District semifinal match-up that won't soon be forgotten.

  After propelling at least four shots against the unforgiving metal perimeter of the goal during the opening 53 minutes, the Rocks' persistence paid off when Evan Antich's left-footed laser met nothing but mesh netting with 27:25 to play.

  Thanks to some late-game heroics from senior goal-keeper Sasa Miskovic and the Rocks' defensive back wall, Antich's goal proved to be the difference-maker in a remarkable 1-0 contest that elicited a steady stream of ooohs and aaahs from the fired-up crowd.

  "That was as intense a game as you'll ever see," said Salem coach Ed McCarthy. "If someone would have asked me before the game started what the score would be, I would have predicted a 1-0 game. These games kind of inevitably end up like that. But there could have easily been a lot more goals in this one."

  That's an understatement.

  It was nearly 1-0 in the game's fourth minute when Northville appeared to score on a Doug Beason rebound shot. In fact, the scoreboard read 1-0 and the players were lined up for the ensuing mid-field free kick until McCarthy alerted the refereeing crew that the ball never crossed the goal line.

  After the west sideline ref and the central ref discussed the play for close to a minute, they waved off the goal.

  "On the initial shot, the player cleared it off the line and the linesman never indicated it was a goal," McCarthy explained. "Then the second player kicked it off the side of the net, and the linesman thought that was the goal. The central ref ruled that that wasn't a goal. It was just a misunderstanding between the referees."

  There was a flurry of golden scoring opportunities mid-way through the first half. With 24:45 left, Beason rocked the right post hard with a shot from 20 yards out.

  Just over nine minutes later, Salem's Lachlan Savage sent a bending direct kick toward the top shelf of the Northville goal, but a leaping Nick Shaya re-directed it with an outstretched fist.

  Less than a minute later, Salem's John Krutty banged the cross bar from 30 yards out.

  The Rocks' final first-half threat came with five seconds left when Antich's low, hard left-footer from 10 yards away rolled wide right by a foot.

  The most amazing individual effort of the night unfolded nine minutes into the second half when Salem's Scott O'Connor fed the ball in front to Dan Martin, who executed an electrifying 360-degree bicycle kick that sent the ball sailing a foot high of the cross-bar.

  Antich deposited the ice-breaking goal seconds after a Salem corner kick when he settled the ball eight yards from the goal line and smoked a no-doubter past a helpless Shaya.

  "I saw Lachie (Savage) going for the header and Dan (Martin) was right there," Antich recalled, "I just kind of came out of nowhere and tried to put something on it.

  "That has to be one of my top two biggest goals ever. The last time we played here I scored two goals, so I love playing at Northville."

  Salem defender Brandon Barfuss helped preserve the shutout with 18:30 to play when he pick-pocketed the ball from a surging Beason, who was advancing the ball rapidly toward the center of the 18-yard box.

  With 11:40 on the clock, Antich squeezed between a pair of Northville defenders and earned a one-on-one match-up with Shaya until he was tackled 10 yards from the goal by two Mustangs.

  The subsequent no-call ignited a disbelieving response from the Salem bench.

  "It takes a lot of courage to make that call because, essentially, it would have decided the game," McCarthy said. "But if on a break-away a player is hauled down from behind -- and there's no room for interpretation on this in the rule book -- it's a red card and a penalty shot.

  "For them to give us nothing there...If Northville would have tied it later on, it would have been very unfortunate. Evan deserved that goal."

  "I saw the open space," Antich said, recounting the incident, "and I went for it. The next thing I knew I was on the ground."

  Northville's final scoring threat may have been its best of the night -- a sizzling direct kick from 25 yards out off the foot of Fatai Alashe that Miskovic managed to fist away.

  On Saturday at noon the Rocks will square off against Livonia Churchill in the District final game. The unbeaten and No. 1-ranked Chargers defeated Salem, 1-0, in the teams' lone encounter this season.

  Churchill advanced to the final game with a 1-0 overtime win over Livonia Stevenson Wednesday night.

  "They're very good on re-starts and they're very organized defensively," McCarthy said, looking ahead to his next opponent. "They've only given up six goals all year, so they're difficult to score against."

  Antich stopped short of saying the Rocks are a team of destiny.

  "All I know is that we want it really bad because of what happened last year," he said, referring to the Rocks' 1-0 loss to Saline in a 2008 Regional final. "We'd like to do it for those guys that graduated and for ourselves because we couldn't quite do it last year."


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