Richmond — The Richmond boys soccer team raced out to a five-goal, first-half lead en route to a 9-2 victory over Pine Tree Academy in a battle of Class D South teams.
Dakotah Gilpatric tallied three first-half goals, while Nick Adams added a pair of goals and four assists for the Bobcats, who improved to 5-1-1. After winning three straight contests, the Breakers fell to 3-3-0.
From the onset, Richmond controlled the play and found paydirt just 1:44 in when Adams hooked up with Gilpatric for the game’s first score. Minutes later, the Bobcats passed the ball down the field like they were threading a needle when Adams connected with senior Dan Stewart for another goal.
“We’re trying to get them away from a lot of dribbling,” Richmond coach Peter Gardner said. “Because dribbling accomplishes nothing unless your down in the space (in front of the net).”
And that’s exactly how the home team scored the next goal. At 30:12, Justin Vachon found the back of the net after the junior dribbled past several Pine Tree defenders to beat keeper Liam Knowles.
Gilpatric registered the final two goals of the frame, one off another Adams helper and his third of the half, and an unassisted tally with only 37 ticks on the clock.
“We were able to play today, work with each other and get our passing down,” Gilpatric said. “It’s pretty important because when we play against bigger teams, we will need to execute our passing more so we have possession of the ball more.”
While the Bobcats put 15 shots on net in the first 40 minutes, again it was the crisp passing by the defending Class D South champions that pleased Coach Gardner.
“That’s what we’ve been trying to do. We work on it every practice, we just do it and do it,” the coach said. “We are constantly doing drills working on our technique with touches, as many touches as we possibly can and then try to get them to link the way they need to link, and I thought they did that very well today.”
Pine Tree’s Noraj Jean-Louis put the Breakers on the board less than three minutes into the second half with an unassisted score.
Soon after, Richmond rattled off four unanswered goals from three more different players over the next 15 minutes to pull away. The Bobcats received a pair of goals from Adams and tallies from Cole Alexander and Chance Taylor.
“We aren’t a selfish team, we like to pass it around,” Gilpatric noted. “And when we do get a good look, we hope to finish up.”
Breaker’s Josiah Yeaton capped the scoring with an unassisted goal late in the contest.
“They gave their best without any subs today against one of the best teams we’ll face,” Pine Tree coach Leszek Kryzwon said of the effort his team put forth. “They (Richmond) are a very good team and I wanted to play them to see where we stand.”
“They have some kids that have some good wheels and can do good things,” Gardner noted of Richmond’s opponent.
Knowles made 18 saves in net for the visitors, while Kyle Underhill-Tilton tended the net in the first half without facing a shot and Logan Bickford stopped two shots in the second half.
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