Young Bruins fall in soccer opener

An experienced Gilman team, expected to contend for the MIAA A Conference title, was more than a youthful Park soccer team could handle, in the season opener for the both teams on Thursday, as the host Greyhounds defeated the Bruins, 5-0.

Five different players scored for Coach Jon Seal’s team, and the Gilman defense limited the Bruins to just two shots on goal all day. Andrew Harris and Gorde Koerber manned the nets for the Greyhounds, who open their MIAA A Conference season on Sept. 14 when they host Loyola.

Despite the dominating win on Thursday, Seal saw room for improvement in his team’s play.

“I saw some things we need to work on,” said Seal.  “I give Lucky’s (Mallonee) kids a lot of credit. He’s got a young team, and they disrupted us a little bit.”

Mallonee is starting his 37th year as a coach at Park, a remarkable record.

“We’re young, and this will be a year for us to build again,” said the veteran Bruin mentor.

Gilman got their first goal eight minutes into the game when Garrett Peters scored on a feed from Joey Cahalan.  Jake Matthai made it 2-0, 12 minutes later, on a throw-in from Ryan Tucker, and Cotter Brown made it 3-0 on an unassisted goal with five minutes to go in the first half.

The Greyhounds got two second half tallies. Cahalan scored a feed from Anthony Kim at 23:07, and Tyler Fahr finished the scoring at 15:39 with Mike Kelly getting the assist.

Bruin goalie Jake Abrams had 16 saves on the day.