Press here to go back to the Tampa Bay High School Soccer home page.LAKE CITY, FLORIDA -- Two Pinellas County boys soccer teams, Clearwater Central Catholic (3A) and Seminole Osceola (4A) will be playing for state titles today. Since Thursday's matches were rained out, it pushed the championships back to today. St. Pete Times Tampa boys soccer writer Chris Rotar will be covering the games. I would have liked to go, but I was already in Tallahassee for three days, and I couldn't miss any more time off from my regular job as a software engineer at Group Technologies Corp. The following information comes from the Tampa Tribune:
In the Class 3A championship game, Clearwater Central Catholic (15-10-2) will seek a record ninth state title and third in a row against Melbourne Central Catholic (24-2-5) at 3 p.m. CCC coach Jim Harte said his team will try and come out and play the most intense 10 minutes of soccer it can, like it did in Friday's 4-0 win against Pensacola Catholic.
``We want to come out like storm troopers,'' Harte said. ``We want our guys to know that if they think they deserve to win, then let's go out and show it.''
The title game will be a rematch of a January game won 2-1 by MCC, but because of the schedule CCC played this year, Harte said he believes his team is much stronger than their record shows.
``We are out to prove a point that we are not a 10-loss team,'' he said. ``A lot of teams learn more when they are losing than if they are winning a lot. That's why we were able to beat Gulliver Prep [in a region final 1-0]. If we had not lost to [Gulliver Prep] earlier this year, then we wouldn't have reviewed the tape like we did.''
When Jesuit and Seminole Osceola suit up in today's 4A boys soccer championship at Columbia High School, they will be seeing familiar uniforms. But the team that will wear the orange and white, Osceola, is not the same team Jesuit has beaten twice this year by a combined score of 9-1. As district opponents, Jesuit had little problem with the Warriors this year and erased a 1-0 halftime lead to take the District 11 crown, 5-1.
Jesuit encountered a similar situation in 1996. The Tigers had beaten Clearwater Central Catholic twice during the regular season, but when the two faced off in the state title game, CCC won 1-0 and prevented Jesuit from winning a second consecutive state title.
Jesuit assistant coach Drew Griffin was quick to point out that fact during the postgame talk following the Tigers' 3-0 semifinal win against Jacksonville Bishop Kenny on Saturday night. Now it is Osceola that stands in the way of a second consecutive state title for Jesuit.
``We have been here before,'' Bauman said. Now the Tigers will try to prevent history from repeating itself.
``We will just try to remind them of what happened in the district final when we did not pressure their backs [and trailed at halftime],'' Bauman said. ``We will just have to keep focused.''
Concentration levels will have to be sharp any time Osceola's Mike Servis touches the ball. Servis is on a postseason roll, scoring at least one goal in each of the Warriors' playoff games, including the lone goal in the district final. He had a hat trick in a 4-3 regional final win against Fort Lauderdale Cardinal Gibbons and had the first goal, his 32nd of the year, in Saturday's 2-0 semifinal win against Orlando Bishop Moore.
``He is a big-time player for us and we need him to provide the offensive pressure we need,'' Osceola coach Tim Rachford said.
But Servis may have a more difficult time finding the open space against a Tigers defense that has allowed just 18 goals in 32 games. Led by sweeper Jeremy Poklemba, the defensive unit shut down Bishop Kenny.
©1998 Tampa Tribune.
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