RECAP >> Four games in six days will take a toll on any team, but despite the busy stretch of games it hasn’t contributed to anything in the loss column as of yet for Emmaus as the Hornets remained the lone unbeaten in the Eastern Pennsylvania Conference.
With just five games remaining in the regular-season and the league playoffs set to get underway on October 16, head coach John Cari’s team is still unblemished with a 9-0-4 overall mark and 9-0-3 in league play.
Emmaus finished off last week picking up three consecutive shutout wins over Stroudsburg (3-0), Nazareth (1-0) and Liberty (5-0) and then closed it out with a draw (1-1) against rival Parkland Saturday afternoon in the annual Red Card Cancer Game at Memorial Field.
In Saturday’s game against the Trojans, the two teams battled through two 40-minute regulation periods and two 10-minute overtimes with the result ending in a point for each team.
The Hornets got on the scoreboard first as sophomore Ryan Kiernan continued his torrid scoring pace with his team-leading 10th goal of the season in the 19th minute off an assist from senior Carlos Morales.
Parkland, which had entered the contest winners of 10 straight after a season-opening loss to Central Catholic, tied the game at 1-1 just five minutes into the second half on senior Zach Morales’ fifth goal of the season.
Neither team would score the rest of the way and both teams would have to settle for one point.
Emmaus outshot Parkland 7-4 in the contest and had 7-1 advantage in corners. Senior Ty Bleiler was credited with three saves in net for the Hornets, while his counterpart junior Matthew Link made six stops.
A little over 48 hours later, the Hornets were right back at Memorial Field to begin the first of four games in the next six days taking on a struggling Northampton squad.
Emmaus scored a goal in each half and the defense posted its eighth clean sheet of the season in the team’s 2-0 victory.
Senior John Hanvey scored his first goal of the season in the first half and Kiernan added his 11th in the second as the Hornets blanked the K-Kids by the same two goal margin.
Statistically, Emmaus outshot Northampton 4-1 and 4-0 in corners. Bleiler made just one stop in goal and his counterpart Vincent Santosstefano registered two saves.
The Hornets will return to action on Wednesday at 7 pm. as they travel to Whitehall. The two teams battled to a 2-2 draw to open up the season on September 10.
Emmaus will also travel to Allen on Friday at 3:30 p.m. and then host Ches-Mont foe Downingtown West in a non-league contest at 10 a.m. on Saturday.
To stay updated, follow the team on social media: (Twitter) @EmmSoccer, @Emmaussports and (Facebook) Emmaus boys soccer
Emmaus 2, Northampton 0
No – 0-0 – 0
Em – 1-1 – 2
Em goals: John Hanvey, Ryan Kieran
Em assists: Blaise Verrastro
Emmaus 1, Parkland 1
Pa – 0-1-0-0 – 1
Em – 1-0-0-0 – 1
Em goal: Ryan Kiernan
Em assist: Carlos Morales
Pa goal: Zach Morales
Pa assist: Zach Reightler