Pearl River stifles Salmen comeback

Pearl River’s Kevin Dancer scored a pair of goals, none bigger than his second one, in a 5-2 victory over the Salmen Spartans in a district match held Friday at Salmen.

Pearl River (8-5-6, 3-1), winners of six in a row, took a 3-0-first-half lead, but Salmen (1-3 in district) scored a pair of unanswered goals to make it 3-2, five minutes into the second half.

With the momentum on Salmen’s side, Vincent Piazza made a great pass into the open field to Dancer, who outran a defender and scored a backbreaking goal, giving his team a 4-2 lead.

Dancer credited his teammates for making good passes that led to the goal.

“It was good communication. Adler (Tonan) initially started it and Vinny played a flick to my voice,” Dancer said.

Pearl River added one more when Piazza took a pass from Ernesto Armador and scored to make it 5-2.

Pearl River coach Bob DeVall said his team is coming together.

“Our guys are having a chemistry that is gelling. We took the ball up the middle of the field with a pass on the run with through passes and stuff. I think that was three of the five passes,” DeVall said.

The first half was action packed. Pearl River began with a few scoring opportunities, but couldn’t get the ball in the net. Dancer had a shot that was saved in the second minute and a corner kick by Will Reed was nearly headed in by Tonan during the fifth minute.

Then Salmen took the ball into the offensive zone and Victor Arroyo took a sliding shot that went wide.

The Rebels got on the board in the 11th minute when Tonan sent a shot into the left part of the goal for the opening tally, which was unassisted.

Nine minutes later, PRHS added another one when Tonan sent a pass downfield to Dancer, who made it 2-0.

Salmen’s Arroyo nearly put his team on the board, but sailed a shot high in the 23rd minute. The Spartans had a golden chance to trim the lead to 2-1 when David Diaz took a shot that was saved. The rebound came out and a Salmen player shot it, but off the left post.

The Rebels went up 3-0 in the 31st minute. From midfield, Reed took a shot that went high into the air. When it landed, it hit off Salmen’s goalkeeper and in for a score.

The Spartans continued to play hard and got to within two as Diaz dribbled up the field and posted a netter inside the right post to make it 3-1 at halftime.

In the second half, Salmen trimmed it to 3-2 when Arroyo took a direct kick. The shot was saved, but the rebound went to Chris Gulino, who scored.

Pearl River’s Dancer thwarted the comeback with a goal as the Rebels went on to win.

Salmen coach Tim Rogers talked about the match.

“We kind of put ourselves in it and then we had a few bad plays, we got out-oppositioned a few times and they capitalized. They did a good job of working their game plan.