After a magical season—outscoring its opponents by a combined score of 44-7 on its way to a 7-1 regular season record—the Noam boys soccer team welcomed Kinneret Day School from Riverdale into its home gym in Paramus on Friday, June 5 for its first-round playoff game.
Just 35 seconds into the game, Dylan Breen opened the scoring for Noam, putting them up 1-0. With 5:46 left in the first period, goalie Avraham Kahan blasted a shot into the opposing net. Just 27 seconds later, Kahan got the ball to Yonadav Rimberg, who made it a 3-0 Noam lead. Before the first period came to an end, Noam put another five goals on the board, with Ozzie Jeselsohn, Yechiel Keiser and Joe Baron each scoring one, and Kahan scoring his second and third goals of the game.
Noam put on another offensive show in the second period, which began when Daniel Dresdner scored, putting Noam up 9-0. Just one minute later, Natan Neugroschl scored off of a nice pass from Yonadav Rimberg and, 30 seconds after that, Rimberg scored his second goal of the game. Kinneret finally got on the board with 1:36 left in the first half; they scored after a defensive miscue by Noam, making it an 11-1 game going into halftime.
With 1:16 left in the third period, Uli Weisrose scored. The Noam scoring finally came to an end when Joe Baron took a pass from Ozzie Jeselsohn and put it in the net. Kinneret scored its second goal of the game with just 26 seconds left in the 4th, making the final score 13-2.
There was outstanding goalkeeping by Avraham Kahan and Jake Rothenberg, a brilliant offense that proved extremely difficult to stop and strong play by Natan Rifkind, Zachary Wolf, Noam Troodler, Yonatan Naor, Eitan Weisrose and Ehud Meir. This lineup lifted the Noam boys soccer team to a decisive win its first-ever playoff game.
By N. Aaron Troodler
