March 11, 2012 -
The LMSC Panthers U17 Boys team went 3-0-0 at the Jefferson Cup this past weekend with impressive victories against
Bruno United (Ranked # 1 in Rhode Island), Greater Boca YSA United 94/95 Gold (Ranked # 12 in Florida) and CASL 94
Elite (Ranked # 5 in North Carolina). The game on Friday was against Bruno United and after some initial even exchanges
of play the Panthers took control of the game with an excellent goal scored by Peter Bockarie. The Panthers then increased
their lead with a fine 25 yard left footed shot from Kevin Lawson which flew into the bottom right corner. A welcome
return to fitness after a knee injury saw Sam Stein put the result out of reach of Bruno United when he slotted home the third goal.
Saturday’s game vs. Boca was a very physical and combative game to which the Panthers took the lead within the first five
minutes after some excellent work on the left hand side from Peter Bockarie saw him create some space for a fine right foot
shot to give the Panthers a 1-0 advantage. After an interesting and inspirational half time break the Panthers came out in
the second half ready to finish the job and against a very ill-disciplined Boca team the Panthers were able to increase
their lead from the kick-off after a charging run from Chris Martin saw the Boca keeper make a save that Sam Stein calmly
slotted home the rebound to make it 2-0. In the final minutes the Panthers kept Boca under tremendous pressure and after
some good ball possession and some nice interconnecting passing, a fine move was finished off by an assist from Derrick
Jones to Tyler Glassford who calmly nutmegged the Boca keeper to seal the 3-0 victory. Tyler’s “donkey” celebration
topped of a great effort by the Panthers!
Sunday saw the Panthers playing vs. a technically strong CASL team from North Carolina. In a very intense and physical
game each team create a few chances, but as the game progressed the Panthers were able to gain control of the game and
a very impressive overall team defensive effort prevent CASL from breaking through which enabled the Panthers to grow
in strength and momentum. With 15 minutes to go a ball was played over Chris Martin’s right shoulder and he was able
to hold off the CASL defender and avoid the charging keeper to calmly shoot over the keeper into the top left hand
corner to score the winning goal.
Congratulations to the Panthers.