By Max Clifford
Hometown Weekly Reporter
Westwood High School Boys’ Varsity Soccer brought home a victory from their final road trip of the regular season, taking advantage of early opportunities and keeping Norwood off the board for a 5-0 shutout victory on Thursday afternoon.
The first strong scoring opportunity of the match came for the Mustangs who put a shot on goal from just a few feet away. Westwood’s Alan Frerichs was prepared for the test, snagging the close-range shot to keep the game a scoreless tie early.
On the following possession, Jack Pond found himself in a one-on-one with the Norwood goalkeeper. The goalie came out of the net to meet Pond head-on, but the Westwood senior read the play perfectly and arched a shot over the keeper and into the onion bag. With less than five minutes run off the clock, the Wolverines found themselves with a 1-0 lead.
A few minutes after their opening score, the Westwood lead stretched to 2-0 thanks to the efforts of Thomas Hartigan. The senior made use of some tactful footwork to keep the ball just out of reach of the Norwood defense before putting it just out of the reach of the Norwood keeper.
A busy stretch for the Westwood offense gave way to a defensive standstill for both sides. It wasn’t until the 13th minute of the second half that the Mustangs’ defense finally gave way.
Given a free kick from a Norwood penalty, Kiernan Wang snuck one past the keeper for a 3-0 Westwood advantage.
With the game well in hand, the Wolverines put two more goals on the board for insurance. With just under ten minutes to play, it was Kai Rossum taking a feed from Alexandros Michalacos to the net for the fourth score of the afternoon. Markus Elias wrapped the afternoon up nicely in the final minutes, cashing in from a difficult angle to bring the score to 5-0.
Despite a big final result for his squad, head coach Rick Beidleman hopes to see more even performances as Westwood prepares for the playoffs. “We weren’t quite firing on all cylinders right in the beginning I thought,” he said. “End result was good but we need to play a lot better than that as the season moves on.”
