Conteh leads injured Rams past young Witches

BREWER – One school is rebuilding a boys soccer team decimated by injury.

The other school is rebuilding a team decimated by graduation.

When those schools faced off at Doyle Field on Saturday evening, Bangor – the team further along in its reconstruction effort – emerged with a 4-0 victory over Brewer.

Junior forward Omar Conteh scored a pair of first-half goals, while senior tri-captain Nick Larochelle had a goal and an assist and fellow midfielder Ben Hoke added two assists as the Rams rebounded from Thursday’s 5-1 loss to unbeaten Old Town.

“We really needed a victory after a tough loss to Old Town,” said Larochelle. “It was a tough game, and I think we could have played better, but we’re happy we got the win.”

Bangor, 3-3, is coping with the loss due to injury of five starters, several of whom are unlikely to return this season.

“We’re really back at pre-season form because we’ve had so many injuries,” said Bangor coach Adam Leach. “It’s not that the guys who are playing now aren’t up to the ability, but we’ve just had to put our puzzle back together again. We’re making some mistakes now that other teams made three weeks ago, but we got away with it today.”

Brewer, 0-5, is retooling after graduating 10 seniors from last year’s team and seeing standout senior Andy Frost opt to play football this season. Despite his team being outshot 20-10, Brewer coach Darren Hall found reason for optimism in the Witches effort, particularly in the second half when they limited Bangor to one goal.

“Tonight was a very good night for us,” Hall said. “We’ve certainly improved vastly over where we were two weeks ago.”

That showed primarily on the defensive end, where the Witches used sophomore Ryan Pelletier, juniors Eric Quimby and Paul Gervais, and senior Matt Quimby as a unit for the first time.

Conteh gave Bangor a 1-0 lead 44 seconds into the match. The goal was set up by Hoke’s long throw-in from the left sideline that Brewer sophomore goalie Danny Juilli (10 saves) blocked off the crossbar – right to Conteh for the goal on the rebound.

“We have a play where we have someone grab the far post and I scream ‘go’ and he comes to the near post and then I throw it to him for a skim,” said Hoke, a senior.

Senior forward Sean Boley made it 2-0 off another restart with 26:48 left in the half. This time Hoke kicked the ball from the right wing toward the goal crease, where senior Nate Goodell headed it forward before Boley gained control to score from close range.

Bangor worked the middle of the field to extend its lead to 3-0 with 5:09 remaining in the half. Larochelle gained control of the ball and pushed a lead pass to sophomore forward Adam Towne. Towne then passed ahead to Conteh, who curled a shot past Juilli and inside the right post.

Larochelle scored the only goal of the second half with 16:11 to play, converting the long rebound of Josh Young’s blast off the goal post from 25 yards out.

Like Brewer, Bangor relied on a number of underclassmen, mixing in seven sophomores with the more veteran players on the squad.

One of those sophomores was goalie Austin Smith, who earned the shutout with six saves.