Richardson keys Brewer win

BREWER – The Brewer boys soccer team finally got the kind of offensive output it had been seeking all season long as the Witches earned their first win of the year Thursday afternoon.

Brewer fought a rain-slicked field and survived a second-half scare for a 5-2 victory over Nokomis of Newport at the Pendleton Street field.

Andrew Richardson led the offense with three goals, while Reid McLaughlin added two as the Witches moved to 1-4.

“In practice the passes always connect but we get in the game and they’re a little off,” Richardson said. “Today, they were good.”

Brewer had a 1-0 halftime lead, which it built up to 4-0 when Richardson put in his second goal of the game with 16 minutes left.

Brewer coach Darren Hall pulled his starters, and the Warriors (1-4) quickly took advantage. Thirty-nine seconds after Richardson’s goal, Nokomis sweeper Luther York blasted a hard shot that went into the net. Less than a minute later, the Warriors had another goal when Andrew Richard scored off a pass from York.

“We got back into it, and we did the same thing against Old Town Tuesday,” Nokomis coach Bill Freudenberger said.

Hall put his starters back in immediately and Richardson iced the game with his third score, this time off a through-pass from Shunsuke Sasaki with 9:30 left in the game.

Richardson converted a penalty kick in the first half.

McLaughlin’s first goal came seven minutes into the second half. His second was headed in directly off a throw-in by Prentiss Swett, who also assisted on Richardson’s second goal.

The Witches have struggled to find a consistent goalie, but Chris Brady was solid Thursday. He made six saves on eight shots.

The big offensive effort helped.

“This time the ‘keeper kept us in it and we scored him some goals,” Richardson said.

With the uncertainty in net, the pressure was on Brewer’s defense to make sure Brady didn’t have to work to get to too many balls.

“[Nokomis has] a couple of really fast kids, and if they got around [the defense] and [Brady] made a bad touch on the ball, the ball could be in the back of the net,” said Swett, the starting sweeper.

York’s goal and assist were the first of the senior sweeper’s career.

“We’ve been trying to work that in a little bit,” Freudenberger said. “He has a chance to make a run through if a couple of guys cover for him, and that worked today.”

Nokomis goalie Wayne May stopped 10 of 22 shots.