BLAME IT ON THE RAIN
Knights score four unaswered in romp
By Dylan Butler
BigAppleSoccer.com Associate Editor
Brooklyn, N.Y. – His team had gotten off to a terrible start, giving up a goal even before one of his players touched the ball. But Brooklyn Knights coach Joe Balsamo wasn’t worried.
There was still more than 89 minutes to play and besides, the weather forecast was in his favor. You see, it usually rains when the Knights play at Aviator Field. Heck, it usually rains when they practice there.
So when the skies opened and a driving storm sent the sparse crowd scurrying in the 25th minute, Balsamo sought refuge under an umbrella and figured he had the Ocean City Barons right where he wanted them.
“Maybe it’s luck,” Balsamo said. “I think the rain bless us to play better.”
Balsamo was right, but it also helps to have Venezuelan youth international Juan Guerra and veteran striker Julio Cesar Dos Santos on his side. They combined for four unanswered goals to lift the Knights to a 4-1 victory Wednesday night, a victory that put them back into sole possession of first place in the Premier Development League Northeast Division.
With two games remaining in the regular season, the Knights (8-2-4) lead the Newark Ironbound Express by one point. The expansion Ironbound Express was atop the division for 24 hours, after beating the New Jersey Rangers on Tuesday. Brooklyn is on the verge of clinching a playoff berth, but the club’s sights are still on winning the Northeast Division title.
Desperate for three points to keep their own playoff hopes alive, Ocean City (5-4-5) jumped in front, 1-0, on Byron Carmichael’s fifth goal of the year just 43 seconds into the match.
And it took about that much time for recently signed Dos Santos to make a difference. Coming on for an injured Hemir Niebles in the 44th minute, Dos Santos slipped a clever ball to Guerra on his left and sophomore at Florida International University leveled the match in the third minute of first-half stoppage time.
“That was great,” Balsamo said. “That changed us. It changed us in the locker room, the morale went up and we went back to focusing on winning the game.”
The Knights carried that momentum into the second half. Four minutes after the break, Dos Santos scored what proved to be the game-winner. Tarik Smith took a touch around Barons’ defender Leon Brown in the left side of the 18-yard box and sent a cross to Dos Santos who finished clinically.
“You have to be patient,” Knights captain Jeff Matteo said. “We knew we were going to get some goals. We knew we were going to get some chances. We just had to make sure we didn’t give up anything else. We did a good job of that.”
Ocean City goalkeeper Tunde Ogunbiyi, who will play for Nigeria in the Summer Olympics, robbed Matteo and Matia Damiani within a span of seven minutes.
But Ogunbiyi, who plays at the University of New Hampshire, couldn’t stop Guerra from scoring a brace as the native of Caracas, Venezuela took a cross from Dos Santos and lofted a volley into the net from the top left corner of the 18-yard box in the 78th minute.
“He shows me he’s a professional player,” Balsamo said of Guerra. “He goes on the field and gives 100 percent, he comes off the bench and gives 100 percent. He’s always at practice working hard. He’s a typical player any coach would love to have.”
After sending a glancing header off the far post, Dos Santos closed out the scoring in second-half stoppage time when he was left unmarked inside the box.
“To go from losing 1-0 home and come back to winning 4-1, only good teams can do that,” Balsamo said. “I’m pretty sure I have a great team and a few talented players. These guys deserve to go the playoffs.”
