GUILDERLAND — What rebuilding year"

All the wins were supposed to happen next year for the Guilderland boys’ soccer team. Well, the Dutchmen won 14 games this year and they won the Gold Division of the Suburban Council. Guilderland did so with a 3-1 win over Saratoga on Monday in a make-up game from last Tuesday night.
"We won the division and got 14 wins," Coach Mike Kinnally said after the game. "We also scored more goals than last year. We beat Niskayuna, Colonie, Saratoga, and we tied Bethlehem. That’s a good year."

The good year continues for the Dutchmen as the seeding for the Class AA Section II tournament was announced on Tuesday and Guilderland is the number-two seed from the Suburban Council. The sectionals are split into large-school league seeds. The Big 10 is the other large-school league.

The Dutchmen will host Troy of Big 10 on Friday at 3 p.m. With a victory, Guilderland will host a quarterfinal game against the winner of the Niskayuna-Amsterdam contest, which will also be played on Friday.
"We should have two home games," Kinally said on Monday. "We have one of the top fields in the Suburban Council so that should give us an advantage."

Bounced shots

On Monday, the Dutchmen dominated Saratoga, but did not have much to show for it on the scoreboard. Guilderland led, 1-0, at halftime but had five shots bounce off the cross-bar or goal post.

The Dutchmen finally got in the goal in the 28th minute.

Junior Tony Campagnano scored after getting a pass from his brother, Frank. Tony Campagnano ripped a shot that found the upper part of the goal over the Saratoga goalie.

The Dutch could not add to its lead in the first half, even though they had great shots.

Guilderland finally added to their lead early in the second half.

Sahr Nyuma, an exchange student from Africa, scored after getting a pass from Tony Campagnano that went over the top of the Saratoga defense.

Nyuma buried the shot to give the Dutchmen a 2-0 lead with 37:28 left in the second half.

Guilderland got careless with the ball in its own end and Saratoga took advantage a few minutes later.

The Dutch turned the ball over and Matt Rickard buried a shot past Guilderland goalie Devin Bailey, making it a one-goal game with 34:15 left in the game.

But Guilderland padded its lead a few minutes later.

Zakary DuGuay chipped in a shot after the Blue Streaks’ goalie made a save on a hard shot by Tony Campagnano.

Campagnano’s shot bounced away from the Saratoga goalie and DuGuay was there for the rebound and chipped the ball into the net.

Campagnano was awarded with the assist, his second of the game.

Guilderland continued its strong play and held off any surge from the Blue Streaks. Though the Dutch couldn’t connect on any more shots in the contest, sending balls wide of the goal or even having a couple more hit off the goal posts.
"I think we hit the posts eight times," Kinnally said.

Bailey finished the game with two saves. Saratoga’s goalies combined to make seven saves in the contest.

Guilderland took 25 shots and Saratoga took just three. Guilderland also had nine corner kicks compared to none for the Blue Streaks.
"We didn’t finish all our opportunities," Kinnally said. "It’s seems we are able to score a lot of goals, even against teams that are down a bit, and I don’t mean today, we are able to score. We have 60 goals, and that is a tremendous amount of goals. We’ve been finishing."

"We climbed a big hill"

Winning the Gold Division of the Suburban Council and getting the number-two seed from the league is a big accomplishment for a Guilderland program that was in a downward slide as Kinnally took over several years ago.

It was the 46th win for Kinnally and assistant coach Arn Armstrong since Kinnally became the head coach, replacing the retired Don Snyder four years ago.
"We climbed a big hill to get here," Kinnally said. "And junior varsity was good. We’ll have a lot from that group coming up."

The Dutchmen have been on a roll in the second half of the season. Their only loss in the last eight games came against Suburban Council Blue Division and number-one seed Shenendehowa. The Dutch lost to the Section II power last Saturday.

But Guilderland came back from that loss to beat Colonie, 1-0. Those two teams had been battling for the title all season.

The Dutch also beat Ballston Spa, 6-0, on Friday night.

Guilderland finished the regular season with a 14-3-1 record. The Dutchmen did avenge two losses, beating Saratoga and Colonie the second time through division play.

Each year, the Dutch coaches and players set three goals for the season. The three accomplishments are to win more games, score more goals, and give up fewer goals than the previous year. And, even though they have had a lot of success, only two of those goals were met.
"We’ve given up more goals than all of last year," Kinnally said. "Last year, we gave up 18. This year, we’ve already given up 20. And hopefully we still have three or four more or beyond that if we get through sectionals."