Abington follows Lexow’s lead past Plymouth Whitemarsh

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WHITEMARSH >> The Abington boys soccer team had something to prove to itself Thursday afternoon.

Not satisfied with their play through four games, the Galloping Ghosts wanted to up the standard as they visited Plymouth Whitemarsh with a possible sole stake to the SOL American lead at stake. It only took 24 seconds to get the message across as Abington scored almost right off the tap and never looked back.

Junior Bryce Lexow led the surge with a two goal, two assist performance as the Ghosts topped the Colonials 8-0 to go ahead in the conference table.

“Talking before the game, we knew we had to come out strong,” Lexow said. “Against Boyertown (in the season opener) we didn’t come out strong and learned our lesson. It showed us we had to come out stronger.

“We needed a game like this; we weren’t clicking like we did last year. If we don’t finish, we can’t click as well so getting that many goals in definitely helps us as a team.”

Finding goals was going to take some time for Abington (4-1-0, 4-0-0 SOL American) after graduating Sean Touey and his nearly 30 goals. More important though, was absolving the slow starts that plagued the defending SOL American champions in their first three games.

Prior to Tuesday’s win over Upper Dublin, the Ghosts had trailed in every game. They won both their games this week by a combined 10-0 score due to an enhanced need to score early and keep going.

Thursday, not even 10 minutes into the game, Lexow had recorded two assists and had a goal off a Nevin Baer cross for a 3-0 Abington lead.

“Everything’s been clicking good, we just needed to work on our finishing,” Baer said. “We put a lot of time in on that the last week and it showed today, I thought we finished well.”

Abington’s Nevin Baer challenges Plymouth Whitemarsh’s Chad McNally (10) in their match on Sept. 12.

The first goal came off a nice set-up, with Lexow playing a through ball that Shawn McConnell made a dummy run at, only to let off and let Thomas Santangelo bury the shot with 39:36 left in the first half. Baer and Lexow combined to set up the second, with Baer winning a tackle deep in PW’s end and giving it to Lexow for the winger to serve far post where this time, McConnell put it away six minutes in.

Lexow made it 3-0 when his rocket of a shot off Baer’s cross pinged off a defender and in. The winger added his second goal in the second half, picking off a short pass in the Colonials’ (3-4-0, 3-1-0 SOL American) end, beating a defender and tucking home the effort.

“Knowing I’m a junior now, it’s my time to add more to the team,” Lexow said. “As a sophomore, I had guys in front of me who were doing it so I didn’t feel as inclined but as a junior, I have to take a bigger role.”

One match does not make a season and the Colonials left Thursday eager to put it behind them and get back to work. A busy schedule early has limited them to just three days of training, but they stood with a share of second place in the SOL American after the result and having shown some quality in their prior five matches.

The injury bug has also been a pain for PW early, especially in the back. Freshman Dan Small was called it start at keeper on Thursday and performed well under a lot of pressure. Small made seven stops, including on a breakaway and twice denying Baer to give his teammates a boost.

“Small did a really nice job, we had an unfortunate injury to our goalkeeper so he did a nice job stepping in and again, there’s not much you can do on a lot of those,” PW coach Richard Kessler said. “He’s going to be a good player, he’s got all the confidence in the world. That’s not a reflection on him.”

Kessler said the one issue he saw prior to Thursday was sustaining momentum from match to match. Where the Colonials would look good one day, they didn’t quite have that same output the next time out so Kessler is eager to get the guys out on the practice field and work on some things.

“Today obviously is a big step backward for us after a good win at Cheltenham,” Kessler said. “We’ll hit the training pitch tomorrow and re-draw some stuff up. We don’t have to change too much up, we just have to keep going at it.

“I have confidence in these guys, it’s a long season.”

Abington made it 4-0 late in the first half on a recycled ball following a corner kick. Co-captain Reese Gibbs kept the ball in play on the opposite side of the box, finding Gavin O’Neill who laid it off for fullback Steven Fajardo.

Fajardo hit the ball on a one-time full volley under the bar for a terrific goal.

Following Lexow’s goal to open the second half, Baer put one away on a solo effort in the box and reserve Arsene Bado scored twice after Abington had put in a fresh 11 of substitutes. Baer said he feels like there’s no standout player this season and with a lot of players able to interchange spots, it gives the Ghosts plenty of options.

The Ghosts step out of conference on Monday when they host a CB East side off to a solid start in the SOL Continental at 4:30 p.m.

“We’ve been looking push up more as a group and have more numbers and try different combinations to see what works up top,” Baer said. “It worked out pretty well today. The games have been close recently, which we felt they shouldn’t have been, so the plan was to get out early and finish so we could get other players in.”

ABINGTON 4 4 – 8

PLYMOUTH WHITEMARSH 0 0 – 0

Goals: A – Thomas Santangelo (Bryce Lexow), Shawn McConnell (Lexow), Lexow (Nevin Baer), Steven Fajardo (Gavin O’Neill), Lexow, Arsene Bado, Bado.

Andrew Robinson

Andrew Robinson
Montgomery Media/Lansdale Reporter sports writer.

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