March 29, 2024
BANGOR DAILY NEWS (BANGOR, MAINE

White’s goal lifts Bulldogs> Lawrence wins 1-0

FAIRFIELD – Two teams with identical 2-2-1 records and Eastern Maine Class A schoolboy playoff aspirations exhibited playoff intensity at David Martin Memorial Field Saturday morning.

As it turned out, a goal by Lawrence’s Joel White just 18 seconds into the game stood up as the Bulldogs held off Gardiner 1-0 in a Kennebec Valley Athletic Conference tussle.

Good scoring chances were few as both teams defended tenaciously and contested every 50-50 ball. Lawrence and Gardiner did an excellent job getting numbers back on defense.

Senior goalie Mike LeComte finished with seven saves on 17 shots for the 3-2-1 Bulldogs with his best save coming off Gardiner sniper B.J. Parkin with 12:30 left in the game.

Brett Aitken threaded the needle with a low, diagonal through ball to the left flank and Parkin took the pass in full stride.

Parkin drilled a waist-high 14-yard shot labeled for the far corner but LeComte dove to his left, made the save and then scrambled to pounce on the rebound.

“I saw it coming,” LeComte said. “The shot hit me in the chest and the hands.”

He said he then located the ball and dove on it.

The shutout was the fourth of the season for the senior-laden Bulldogs.

The game’s only goal was set up by an Adam Ellis cross.

“The goalie [Jeff Bickford] dropped the ball and I put it in,” said senior striker White, whose goal was his first of the season.

Bickford took responsibility for the goal.

“I had the cross all lined up but it slipped through my hands,” said Bickford, a junior in his first year as the starting goalie. “I should have had it.” He finished with three saves.

Ellis was a constant threat throughout as he used his speed to make dangerous runs down the flank.

Gardiner had a territorial advantage throughout the game but, as Tiger coach Juan Bustamante said, “We didn’t get a lot of great opportunities. They put a lot of pressure on the ball.

“We played very well. Any time you get 13 corners, you figure you’re going to convert at least one of them. It’s very disappointing,” said Bustamante, whose Tigers fell to 2-3-1 despite outshooting Lawrence 17-6 and generating 13 corners to Lawrence’s seven.

Lawrence coach Ray Winship said his team didn’t play as well as it had in a 3-2 loss to Brunswick two days earlier and credited Gardiner with outplaying his Bulldogs.

“The first 10 minutes of the game was the only time we dominated,” said Winship, who praised the effort turned in by his fullback corps of outside backs Jeremy Stanford and Chris Bolduc, sweeper Josh Richard and stopper Jose LaValle Rivera along with goalie LeComte.

Bustamante lauded the performances turned in by outside fullback Fed Genovese and central midfielder Aitken.

JV: Lawrence 0, Gardiner 0 (OT)


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