SCARBOROUGH — Dave Halligan knew his Falmouth High boys’ soccer team couldn’t foul top-rated and unbeaten Scarborough because the Red Storm are so dangerous on set plays off restarts.
“And the fouls against were 10-1 in the first half,” Halligan said.
Worse, one of those fouls resulted in a penalty kick and Scarborough’s first goal. The Red Storm rode that momentum to a 3-0 win in a Class A South semifinal Saturday.
The penalty kick came in the 17th minute when a Scarborough player who was running toward the ball but away from the goal was taken down from behind.
Defender Samuel Jacob converted the penalty kick.
“I don’t know if that changed the game because we never did score a goal and you have to score to win games, but it’s tough,” Halligan said.
Five minutes later, Garrett King headed in a long-range throw-in by Matt Caron to give Scarborough a 2-0 lead.
“I thought we were playing pretty well before (the penalty kick), but you feel like you’re getting a reward for playing well,” Scarborough Coach Mark Diaz said. “The kids actually got energy from that. I like how we responded after we got the PK.”
Scarborough (14-0-2) will host defending state champ Cheverus on Wednesday in a regional final rematch.
“It should be fun,” Caron said. “We don’t really care who we play, honestly. We’re going to go into the game the same way if we were playing someone else, but they’re a good team so it should be a good test.”
Falmouth, which plays in the Western Maine Conference against mostly Class B opponents, finished with an 11-4-1 record. The Yachtsmen generated some good possession and an occasional run up the wing by Ben Wuesthoff or Matt Polewaczyk but had limited strikes inside the box. When Falmouth had set piece chances, Scarborough’s defense held.
Caron put the game out of reach when he scored on a direct kick from 22 yards, expertly rolling a firm shot to the left of the wall and just inside the right post that caught Falmouth keeper Jesse Melchiskey flat-footed.
“The wall, I don’t know if it was out of place or something, but on our free kicks we’re just trying to test the goalie, so I was just trying to get it on the net,” Caron said.
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