Lukach leads men's soccer to PAC title

by Benjamin Lunn staff writer

The men's soccer PAC championship game was played under a cloudy sky, with a wind that brought with it a cold chill in the air.

This cold chill could have been taken as a sign of foreboding-for the Eastern Eagles.

It was last Wednesday's win against Misericordia that placed the men's soccer team in the championship game.

Wednesday's playoff game was a 1-0 victory for Cabrini.

Senior Paul Donaghy won the game on an unassisted goal. When asked after the game what he thought about the game, head coach Duncan Hubley said, "It was Misericordia as usualtough."

He attributed the win to the players, saying that Misericordia may have a better coach, but that Cabrini has the better players.

In last Sarurday's championship game between Eastem's Eagles and Cabrini's Cavaliers, Cabrini triumphed by a score of 1-0.

It was a goal by first-year srudent Andy Zayas with 6:31 left in the second overtime that gave Cabrini the championship.

When asked about any type of strategy before the game, Hubley simply said, "Win."

Hubley later decided to add to his comments by pointing out that Eastern commonly scores more than Cabrini does, so to win Cabrini must dominate them on defense.

Domination was the name of the game on Sarurday, but with each team playing hard, gaining and losing ground, domination was unachievable. Both teams seemed evenly matched. The first half ended with the score still at zero for both teams.

Right out of the beginning of the second half, Cabrini threw everything they could at Eastern to no avail.

After several close plays and questionable calls, the momentum shifted to Eastern. Eastern never scored from this surge of momenrum, though. Even though a number of times Eastern did get the ball deep into Cavalier territory, they were unable to score. The Cavalier defense proved to be too much.

Understandably, towards the end of the second half, the game started to take its toll on the players.

Players were seen limping and favoring sore legs, knees and shins. Cabrini's goalie, Eric Lukach was observed limping a bit after one particularly good save. He never let the injury affect his performance.

Eventually, the second half came to an end and the score was still 0-0. After a short break, the game went into overtime.

Again, at the start, Cabrini came out fighting, and again the Cavs were staved off by Eastern, and vice versa.

Then the second overtime started.

This overtime was proving to be much like all of the other periods in the game, until the clock hit 6:31 and the Cabrini crowd roared. Zayas had scored; the score was now 1-0.

Despite some close calls and good shots, Eastern was held off for the remaining six minutes of play, giving the Cavaliers a victory and a championship.

PAC finals.

When asked about the game af- terwards, Zayas was at a loss for words.

....

Hubley could only say that this was "an impossible dream."