Yesterday afternoon, the boys’ soccer team braced for a taut game with PSAA rival, Staten Island Academy. Last Monday, the teams staged a rematch of the 2020 PSAA Championship with the Bears prevailing 3-1 in a physical game. Yesterday’s final regular season match-up was a key game that promised to impact the league standings and potential playoff seedings and the Bears expected a fight.

The first 30 minutes held true to that script as the two sides remained deadlocked in a 0-0 battle, but in the final 10 minutes before the half, the lid came off the Bears’ offense as they erupted for four goals. The first came when Dennis Yilmaz sent a cross into the box where pressure from James Fay forced an own goal from the Tigers. Enoch Guo followed by tucking away a rebound off of a long shot from Jayson Amin. The Bears continued the onslaught when a big throw from Stephen Cisz found Joe Spreckels for a header before the Brothers Fay connected when James crossed the ball to John for the final score of the first half.

Despite a commanding 4-0 lead, the Bears continued to press the action in the second half. The scoring began when James Fay sent a high-arcing pass into the box where Amin volleyed it home. Then Ade Adedeji did the rest, scoring a hat trick over the game’s final minutes to emphatically put the contest away. For his first goal he buried Lee Maeba’s rebounded shot, for his second he raced onto a cross from Eason Pu and chipped it over the keeper, and for the crescendo he volleyed in another long throw from Cisz.

The resounding win puts the Bears in the driver’s seat for a third consecutive PSAA regular season title with two more matches to play, both against Portledge. A win in Locust Valley on Wednesday would clinch the title outright as the Panthers already have a notch in the loss column.

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