Old Lyme trying for dual Shoreline Conference soccer titles
Old Lyme didn’t play a boys’ soccer game from its regular-season finale against Westbrook on Oct. 25 until Tuesday’s Shoreline Conference tournament semifinal against Old Saybrook, a 2-0 victory.
During that time, coach Marc Vendetti tried to prepare his team the best he could for the postseason. The Wildcats practiced a couple of days at Montville’s Wide World of Indoor Sports to try to get used to a quicker pace to the game. The matchup against Westbrook, too, was on the artificial turf at Connecticut College, as opposed to the natural grass at Old Lyme.
“We practiced different mindsets,” Old Lyme senior Nate Peduzzi said.
“We brought in a few guest voices,” Vendetti said. “It was a long week and a half off. We asked a lot of the players.”
Today, Old Lyme High School will be represented in the Shoreline finals by not only the boys’ team, but the girls’ team, as well.
Old Lyme’s second-seeded boys’ team, 13-1-3 and the winners of eight straight, will meet No. 1 Morgan beginning at 5 p.m. at Portland High School.
That game will be followed by the girls’ championship game between No. 1 Old Lyme, 13-2-2 and the twotime defending tournament champion, and No. 2 Morgan, scheduled for 7 p.m.
“We talked less about Saybrook and more about how we wanted to play,” Vendetti said after Tuesday’s win. “And that’s nothing against Saybrook; it’s a good, friendly rivalry. But in the last four or five days, we’ve been talking about what we want to do.”
Old Lyme got two goals from Peduzzi to blank Old Saybrook in the semifinals, returning to the championship, where the Wildcats lost to Cromwell last season 2-1 in overtime.
The Wildcats are looking forward to being at full strength for the first time in a while, as Joel Driscoll and Ian Humphries were just returning from injuries against Old Saybrook and Cooper St. Germain is expected to return to the midfield Friday.
The Old Lyme girls’ team, meanwhile, topped Coginchaug 10-4 in the semifinals, getting five goals from
freshman Mya Johnson and six assists from sophomore Maddie Ouellette. Four of Ouellette’s assists came on goals the Wildcats scored off their eight corner-kick opportunities.
Old Lyme, as opposed to last year’s senior-laden team, is made up of just four seniors this year, Silja Forstein, Kyra Teixeira, Tori Sims and Sam Lee, along with numerous underclassmen.
“I’m going to embellish here,” coach Paul Gleason said. “They were great leaders last year, tremendous kids. But we have a team where everybody supports everybody all the time. … They don’t get the nerves; they just go out and play because they love to play.”
“The freshmen were probably a little intimidated (at first),” Teixeira said of this year’s team. “But right from when they first came, they had a solid group of freshmen. They just got incorporated.”