Bears fall to Freedom in EPC boys soccer playoffs

BETHLEHEM — Pleasant Valley’s boys soccer team dropped a 2-0 decision to host Freedom on Saturday night in the quarterfinal round of the Eastern Pennsylvania Conference playoffs.

“I think we scrapped with them for a long time and the two they got, one was just a strength and speed thing and the second one was a free header. Other than that I’m happy with the way we played. It’s just that they’re a very good team,” said Pleasant Valley coach Chris Pachuta.

The first half provided no scoring for either side, so the fifth-seeded Bears made a couple of adjustments at halftime, while the Patriots stuck with their game plan.

“We tried to play a little bit more over the top to try and see if we could get behind their backs. We tried to make a couple almost design changes here and there,” Pachuta said. “Defensively, everything else was staying the same. We were happy with where we were at. From that point, we were going to keep pushing and look for that one chance and one goal.”

At the 34:06 mark, however, Freedom forward Brad Turocy scored on an assist by center mid Will Tichy. Turocy had made several attempts in the first half, one of which was cleared out by Pleasant Valley defender Collin Stivala.

“My backs, and Jon Mickens who plays defensive midfielder in front of them, they do a good job of blocking shots, getting themselves behind and making sure that not a lot of balls are getting on goal. It just happened that a ball played over the top, they outran us, and it went from there,” said Pachuta about the first goal “We knew they were big, strong and fast. I had plenty of film on them, so we knew what we were coming into and we tried to battle them a little bit, their center midfield, especially.”

The Patriots also knew what the Bears were bringing to the match.

“We played them in summer league, so we kind of knew some of the players they had. We knew they had 11 wins going in, so we knew they were a solid team,” said Freedom defender Andrew Youwakim, who scored the Patriots’ second goal on a header with 16:27 left in the game. “It was by the penalty spot and I had to adjust a little bit and just put my head on it and it went behind the keeper.”

Chris Price made seven saves for the Bears.

UP NEXT ... The Patriots will move on to a semifinal match against Parkland. Emmaus will face East Stroudsburg South in the other semi. Both games will be Tuesday at a time and place to be determined.

WAIT A MINUTE ... The Bears will be part of next week’s District 11 playoffs, but their district seeding points are not set yet. “We have one more regular season game,” said Pachuta. “We play at Central Bucks West on Friday. Our non-conference games haven’t been put in yet and they’re big schools, so we might get a bunch of power points.”