St. Paul’s Lions Captures Mercer County CYO Title

The St. Paul’s Lions CYO boys soccer team this past week capped an outstanding 2012 season with a sensational 6-0 shutout of St. Gregory the Great in the finals of the Mercer County CYO tournament giving them their second consecutive league and tournament titles, four years after the inception of the program.

“I recall taking the field four years ago with predominately fifth-graders when we initiated the program,” said Coach Pat Trombetta. “Although we were extremely undersized, we clearly demonstrated that we had a great understanding of how to play the game and I knew this would be a special group going forward.”

The Lions went through the regular season 10-0 and capped the year at 12-0 after the tournament games.  More impressively, the Lions defense, anchored all season by Michael Bamford, Brendan Cortez, Alex Hall, MJ Cobb with Conor Donohue in goal, did not allow a goal the entire season, while the team scored 55 goals in their 12 games.

St. Paul’s took control immediately at the game’s outset, taking a 1-0 lead at 1:40 of the first period on a driving kick by Chris Bobev.  The lead changed to 2-0 moments later with a terrific header by Bobev off of a corner kick by Rory Hogan.  By the 8:00 mark of the first period the score was 3-0 due to great ball movement leading to a score by Jack Pagliante.

The St. Greg defense then came alive, shutting down St. Paul’s for the remainder of the first half.  St. Paul’s started the second half, as they did the first, with three additional scores by Rory Hogan, Daniel Fajardo and Marcelo Espana, effectively closing the door for any potential comeback by St. Greg.

Going back to last season, the Lions are 22-0-2, scoring 100 goals while giving up only five. 

“Although these stats are impressive,” said Coach Trombetta, “the one thing I am most proud of is our team chemistry.  I have been around the game a long time and you don’t see a group of boys of various ages and skill levels come together like we did and play as a team.  I believe we had 18 players who scored goals this season.”