St Mary’s boys drop heartbreaker to Marian, 2-0

LYNN – Going into its game with league power Marian at Manning Field on Monday, St. Mary’s chances looked, shall we say, a little daunting.Yet while the Spartans ultimately lost, 2-0, they played the Mustangs tough, with the game being scoreless until 22 minutes into the second half.Click here for a photo gallery.”We played very well tonight,” St. Mary’s coach Mike D’Agostino said. “Our defense took it to them.”The Spartans fell to 6-7-1, 3-7 Catholic Central League/Large. Their coach still sounded hopeful of making the tournament.”We have five more games and we must win three to make it,” he said. “Our next game is Wednesday against Arlington Catholic. If we can get some of our walking wounded back, we should be OK.”Yesterday’s foe entered with a formidable resume. The Mustangs came in at second place in the CCL/Large with a league record of 7-1 and overall record of 11-2. Marian boasted the two top scorers in the league: Yuri Catao (16 goals and 28 assists for 44 points) and Pat White (16 goals and 17 assists for 33 points).Making things worse, three Spartans – co-captain/defender Zach Paone, defender Nick Moschella and top striker Ralph Bertrand – were all out for the game, with the possibility that they will miss additional games.Despite all the obstacles, it was a close game. For 62 minutes, the Spartans played the Mustangs dead even.It greatly helped that freshman keeper Helio Meirelles Neto saved everything that the Mustangs fired at him – including a point-blank blast from Catao – in the first half.Meanwhile, the Spartan defenders – sweeper/co-captain Jeremy Tranfaglia, Jon Mandragouras, Dominic Barceleau and freshman Andrew DiMaiti – played Marian to a standstill. DiMaiti was the star of the defense. He started out covering Catao tightly. When Catao was injured, DiMaiti switched over and picked up Marian’s second top scorer, White, covering him just as effectively.At midfield, sophomore Alexander Alleyne controlled the flow of the offense and was the transition up to the strikers. When Catao and White were both in the game, Alleyne covered White, who played midfield.Up front, striker Julian Yourawski was the only threat for the Spartans. He never stopped trying to attack the Marian goal. He was stopped by the tall Marian defense. Marian keeper Tim Walsh controlled everything in and around the net for the entire game.Marian broke through in the 62nd minute when Catao picked up a crossing pass from Yhun Sun Chu and, from the top right edge of the area, blasted a shot to the top left corner past Neto.Twelve minutes later, in the 74th minute, the same two Marian strikers were involved in the second goal. Catao carried the ball through the midfield circle, saw Chu breaking up the middle and hit him with a perfect through pass that Chu picked up behind the defenders, having only the keeper to beat. Neto came off his line, and when he was almost to the striker, Chu flipped a little shot over the diving Neto. The ball rolled into the right side of the net to make the score 2-0, Marian.Marian coach Matt Goppo said, “St. Mary’s is much improved from the last time we played them in Framingham. (DiMaiti) was all over my two shooters. He did a better job on them than anyone else has so far this year. We are now looking forward to the last game of the year. We have already qualified for the states and if everything breaks right, we will play Spellman in Brockton for the league title. We have not won a league title in 22 years.”