E.D. White pushes past Calvary Baptist

Fri. February 10, 2012 at 9:49 a.m. | By Teddy Renois/Staff Writer

E.D. White's Seth Ledet (3) prepares to kick as Calvary Baptist's Blaine Scott looks on during Thursday's playoff match. (Photo by Abby Tabor/Staff)

E.D. White Catholic had Calvary Baptist back on its heels in Thursday's Division II regional playoff match.

Calvary fell back in a defensive mode in the first half and E.D. White took advantage by controlling the ball and peppering the Cavaliers' goaltender with several shots.

Eventually one of those shots got through, giving E.D. White a lead that its defense would protect. The Cardinals added two more goals in the second half and advanced in the state playoffs with a 3-0 win on Yockey Bernard Field at Harvey Peltier Stadium.

The Cardinals, the No. 2 seed, will be home for next week's quarterfinals match against the winner of the Beau Chene/St. Michael's match. The time and date of the match is yet to be determined.

E.D. White (23-2-1 overall) received a bye to start the playoffs and was coming off a 10-day layoff. Cardinals coach Roger Bimah said that he was concerned about the layoff, but once Calvary sat back defensively, he knew his team would get into its flow.

"In the first 20 minutes, with them sitting back, that allowed us to work around them (with our offense)," Bimah said. "They were in trouble in what to do. Either they pressed and we could get behind them, or sit back and let us play in front of them. We got that first goal and the whole game changed on that goal."

After two corner kicks and two shots on goal produced nothing for E.D. White, the Cardinals got on the scoreboard on its third corner kick of the first half.

E.D. White's Rene Thibodaux sent the ball in front of the goal and it landed on the foot of Derrick Knight. Knight gathered the ball and deflected it past the goalie into the net. The goal made it 1-0 in the 13th-minute of play.

Knight said that he got a perfect ball from Thibodaux to score.

"I just got a perfect ball from a corner," Knight said. "I just placed it into the corner of the net. We did start slow, but we got it going and scored an goal early. We do like to put pressure on our opponents and I knew we would eventually begin to play strong."

E.D. White continued to pressure Calvary's defense in the first half, but neither team scored leaving it a 1-0 Cardinals advantage at halftime.

The Cardinals extended its lead in the 53rd minute when Colby Masse had the ball on the right side and he sent a pass through the box. The ball found its way to Alan Frost who blasted a dart past the goalie for the 2-0 lead.

Calvary (14-3-3) didn't take a shot on goal in the first half and didn't do much better in the second half, however, the Cavaliers had its best scoring chance come in the 59th minute.

Near the top of the 35-yard box, Calvary's Zak Kosin battled two defenders and had the ball on his foot in front of the goal. Kosin put his foot into the bouncing ball but it went high over the crossbar leaving Calvary scoreless.

"We didn't anticipate being defensive, but they have a lot of skill players and are very fast to the ball," Calvary coach Shelley McMillian said. "We are a young team, but we fought hard. It wasn't by design to fall back, but in the second half we put some more numbers in and took chances. I thought we played a good second half, but they are a great team."

The Cardinals final goal came in the 70th minute when Parker Naquin got lose on a breakaway and scored for the 3-0 lead.

NO. 9 VANDEBILT CATHOLIC 2,

NO. 8 NEVILLE 1 (BOYS)

At Monroe, the Terriers advanced to the Division II quarterfinals after goals by Tyler Eaton and James Daigle helped send them to victory on Tuesday night.

Patrick Watson got the victory in goal for Vandebilt, which will host Division II's top ranked team, St. Louis Catholic, at 5 p.m. on Tuesday in the quarterfinals.

"It takes zero talent to hustle," Vandebilt coach Matt Kelso said, "but (Tuesday) night, we played like talented hustlers."

St. Louis beat Vandebilt in the state finals the last two season. The Saints are ranked ninth in the country.