Your Soccer Sabers once again have made themselves known in the area by executing an incredible first round upset victory last night. The Sabers, seeded 13th in the regional playoffs, had a decisive victory over #4 seed Monticello on Monticello’s home field ending their season early and continuing the amazing inaugural season of Sabre soccer. Under windy conditions with Monticello having the advantage of the wind in the first half, the Sabres held Monticello scoreless with several key saves by Jonathan File in his outstanding performance as Keeper throughout the game. The Sabre defense repeatedly shut down Monticello’s attacks frustrating some of the areas best scorers.

Scoreless at half time, Monticello came out in the second half ready to play and launched several aggressive offensive attacks with a clear intent to put points on the board and shut down the Sabres. Again holding them at bay, the Sabres held their ground and began to push hard against Monticello taking advantage of the winds. The Monticello defense began to tire against repeated Sabre attacks and at 18 minutes into the second half it happened — a left-footed shot from MinKyun Park put the Sabres up 1-0. The team and fans went wild. Maintaining their composure the Sabres continued to launch attacks against a fast-weakening Monticello team. At 27 minutes into the second half, Tyler Johnson put away another goal that sealed the victory for the Sabres. Playing out the final 13 minutes of the game, Monticello was desperate and cold not coordinate a concerted offense against the Sabers.

The game closed with ecstatic players and fans completing a 2-0 victory against Monticello who were noted as being “a team to watch” in area play. The Sabre’s record for the season is now an incredible 15-5-0.

The Sabres proceed to the next round playing the winner of Math 3 played on Saturday between #12 seed Meridian and #5 seed Decatur Luthern. Monday’s game will be at Monticello at 4:00pm. Come out and support your Sabre Soccer team!!

It seems you should be!!  The inaugural Sabre Boys Soccer team has had a wonderful start, undefeated in JV play (5-0-0) and, as a JV team, making a strong showing in varsity play with a 2-2-0 record for an overall record of 7-2-0!!

Come out and support the team at their coming games:

Thursday, Sept 21 against Judah Christian played at Jones Park in Savoy.
Wednesday, Sept 27 against Catlin played on our “home” field in St. Joseph
Thursday, Sept 28 against Iroqouis West played at St. Joseph.

Directions to Jones Park:  From STM take 1-57 south to Monticello Road; take Monticello Road east (left) to Rt. 45; take Rt. 45 north (left) past the Savoy Super Wal-Mart to the next stop light which is Old Church Road; take Old Church Road west (left) past the first stop sign where you will see the Champaign Head Start building.  Jones Park is just behind that building.

Directions to St. Joseph Fields (Crestwood Park):  From STM take I-57 south to I-74; take I-47 east to the St. Joseph Exit; go south (right) toward St. Joseph to the first stop sign which is East Warren/US-150; Take East Warren east (left) 0.6 miles to Sherwood Dr.; take Sherwood Dr. north (left) 0.3 miles and end at Crestwood Park.

The Sabres played their fourth varsity match against Georgetown/Ridgefarm this evening and commanded the game marking up another varsity win.  Lead by two unassisted goals by Tyler Johnson the Sabres had things well in hand.  Final score: STM 6, Georgetown/Ridgefarm 1 with the Sabres now posting a 7-2-0 record and a 2-2-0 record in varsity games.

A simmering rivalry finally saw the Sabres facing the Monticello Sages on Tuesday. On a cool and blustery afternoon, the Sabres played a very strong first half to a draw while playing at a disadvantage against the wind. The game finally broke open in the second half on a goal by Jeremy Towns from a corner kick by AJ Sikorski. Things went downhill fast for the Sages at that point with the Sabres hitting the back of the net twice more times while shutting out Monticello. Final score: STM 3, Monticello 0 pushing the teams record to 6-2-0.

[Rumor has it that Coach Cox was particularly pleased with this win.]

The Sabres Soccer team split games with Teutoplis over this past weekend.  On a fabulous day for soccer on Teutopolis’ very nice pitch, the first game played at a varsity level and was a hard-fought loss.  Our JV team played strong against their varsity team, but lost strength in the second half.  Final score: STM 1, Teutopolis 6.

After a very brief rest, the team then faced Teutopolis’ JV team.  The fist half closed with the Sabres tired and down by a score of 0-2, but found strength and inspiration during half time and came back fighting.  A very exciting second half saw the Sabres come from behind with two quick goals followed shortly by a third to complete the amazing comeback.  Final score: STM 3, Teutopolis 2.

A tiring weekend left their record at 5-2-0 with a varsity record of 1-2-0.

Facing rumors of a strong JV team and an oversized field, the Sabres were more than up to the task facing UniHigh and registering another win — final score: STM 6, UniHigh 1.  This puts the first-year Sabre Boys Soccer team record at 3-1-0.

Sabre Soccer recorded another victory pushing their record to 2-1-0 on Saturday with a strong showing in a varsity match against Heyworth.  Final score: STM 6, Heyworth 0.  Lead by 2 goals from Sammy Fuentes combined with a defensive line that simply stonewalled the Heyworth offense, the Sabres dominated the game and marked up their first varsity win.  This second varsity match for the JV team gives them a 1-1-0 varsity record.

STM Soccer hits the road early tomorrow (Saturday) to play two games against Teutopolis in T-Town.  We will play both varsity and JV levels against them testing the stamina of the team.  Wish your fellow Sabres luck if you see them today!!

Players:  Remember that we will meet at 7:30am at STM; we leave at 7:45am.

Also, game summaries are coming so you can get synopses of the ongoing successes of this program!

Welcome all to your source of information for the STM Soccer program.  We will be posting various bit here for both the players and all who are interested in the progress of this new program.

A huge thanks goes to the Mr. Millage and Coach Henessey for their support of this program.  We are off to a great start and have high hopes.