Rye Neck Girls Soccer The Magical Run Comes to an End

Rye Neck Girls Soccer
The Magical Run Comes to an End

– By Jim Byrne –

The clock finally stuck midnight for Cinderella Wednesday, Nov. 1, in Nanuet as the Golden Knights defeated the Panthers, 6-1, but the road to the Class B semifinal is one that will long be remembered for Rye Neck.

“Nobody gave us a chance in the playoffs this year,” said head coach Doug Choron. “This is truly a team that improved tremendously throughout the year. We won 12 games in a row. People thought we might have a respectable showing in the first round, but no one expected us to get to the semifinals in the B division.”

After maintaining status as a force to be reckoned with in Class C for many years, Rye Neck made the switch to Class B this season. As the smallest B school in the entire state, the Panthers magical run began after a 1-3 start. They would go on to win 14 of their next 15 games, including 12 in a row. After a 4-3 win over Westlake to kick off the 12-game win streak, they rallied off 48 unanswered goals over 10 games en route to an epic battle with private school Albertus Magnus in the Class B quarterfinals.

After defeating 12th seeded Pleasantville in the first round of the Class B tournament, 1-0, the No. 5 Panthers headed to West Nyack Monday, Oct. 30, looking for their 12th straight win and a shot at Nanuet in the semifinals. The clash with the Falcons would take everything Rye Neck had to offer.

Albertus Magnus came into the game wearing their pristine, white home uniforms. After regulation, two overtimes, and a climatic penalty kick session, the Falcons would walk off of their field bruised, battered, dirtied and defeated. The Panthers pulled out all of the stops in slaying Goliath, 2-1.

“Today, little school beats private school,” said Choron after the victory. “In my 22 years of coaching, nothing – in my opinion – is more unfair than private schools playing in public school playoffs. I didn’t want to end the season that way.”

Rosina Calisto opened the scoring in the first half for Rye Neck, as her powerful shot smashed into the crossbar and dropped quickly down and behind the goalie for a 1-0 Panther lead. They took that lead into the half, but the Falcons would respond with a Brittany Tartara goal in the second half to knot things up.

The game soon turned into a bit of a slugfest, with mostly Rye Neck dishing out the pain. It seemed as if every few minutes or so another Falcon player was down in the dirt with Albertus Magnus parents and supporters pleading with the officials to make a call.

The calls never came, and the game soon headed for overtime.

In both sets of overtimes, Jessica Wright saved the day on multiple occasions for the Panthers. The Falcons had incredible scoring opportunities, but Wright was there to foil their chances time and again.

After 80 minutes of regulation, 20 minutes of the first overtime, and 10 minutes of a second overtime, the game was still knotted at one. That meant that penalty kicks would decide who was advancing and who was going home.

Calisto was able to score on the first penalty kick, and Wright’s constant motion in net forced the Magnus kicker to miss the entire goal wide right, giving the Falcons the early advantage, 1-0. Lona Speidell – the bane of the Falcons existence due to her tough, hard-nosed play – popped the ball into the left corner of the net on Rye Neck’s second penalty kick chance. Wright made the subsequent save, giving the Panthers a crippling 2-0 advantage.

After a pair of shots that went over the goal for both Rye Neck and Magnus on respective third opportunities, Aryn Higgins came up for the Panthers with Rye Neck needing just one more goal to win it all and advance.

She found the back of the net, and the Panthers rejoiced.

“It was brilliant,” said Choron. “We had lost last year on penalty kicks, so this was special. We put a lot of time in practicing. The players stuck to the game plan today. I love ‘em. I love this team. It was a team effort today. You cannot beat a private school like Magnus without a total team effort.”

The amazing run came to an end against Nanuet in the next round, but luckily for Rye Neck and Choron, the Panthers will return most of their team next season. They only lose two players, seniors Higgins and Allison Cook.

Most importantly, perhaps, is that they return their freshman dynamo in the net – Wright.

“Our goalie started in the eighth grade,” said Choron. “I didn’t have a goalie last year so I walked up to her in the middle school hallway and said, ‘Hey Jess. Congratulations, you’re the starting Varsity goalie.’” He added, “She is so intelligent. She followed my instructions to a T for those penalty kicks. She deserves a lot of credit, especially with that save she made in the last 30 seconds of the game. It was incredible – and as a ninth grader too! It’s phenomenal.”

Although it ended in defeat, Rye Neck’s 2006 season was, indeed, phenomenal.