For the fourth straight year the girls’ soccer team swept the Holy War in yesterday’s 2-1 win over Smithtown Christian. The Bears have now won nine in a row against the Knights, with their last loss coming on September 24, 2011. During the game the girls donned pink socks and commemorative t-shirts for their annual Kicks for Cancer game, a Section-wide initiative to raise support for breast cancer research.

Morgan Pius opened the scoring for the Brook in the 5th minute. After the Knights failed to clear the ball from their defensive zone, Jessica Nwachukwu gave a nice feed to Pius who finished with a beautiful, sweeping shot into the side netting from 20 yards. The Bears had several more chances before the end of the half, but settled for a 1-0 lead at the break.

Smithtown came out with renewed vigor as the second half opened and scored a heady hustle goal off of a defensive miscue just five minutes into the period. From there the rivals battled to a draw for the next 20 minutes. With 17 minutes left, it looked as though the Bears would retake the lead, but a gorgeous strike from Pius rattled the crossbar to keep the score level. Two minutes later, Pius was awarded a free kick and struck an absolutely perfect ball from 40 yards that looked destined for the top shelf. Smithtown’s goalie made a great fingertip save, but was unable to secure the ball, allowing Nwachukwu to touch home the rebound and give the Brook a 2-1 edge.

Smithtown made several aggressive runs at the goal over the final 15 minutes, but Alyssa Martinez almost single-handedly kept them off the board, flying around the backfield and spiriting balls away from attacking forwards. The Knights had one final gasp with five minutes left after earning a corner kick. Smithtown sent it into the box, but Fiona Farrell made a great save to seal the victory. Farrell finished with 3 saves.

The Bears are back in action on October 13 vs. Port Jefferson.

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