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Goalie Bass Leads Cougars To Wharton Title

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By JARRETT GUTHRIE

Tribune correspondent

Published: January 11, 2009

TAMPA - Durant goalkeeper Connor Bass made two huge diving saves in a penalty-kick shootout as the Cougars won the Wharton Invitational championship 3-2 in penalty kicks (4-2) against Sickles.

Durant (18-1) and Sickles (12-3-2) matched up well as both teams possessed the ball equally and went back and forth for most of the match.

Sickles' Sebastian Matta took advantage of his team's first real opportunity inside the Cougars' box, driving in a loose ball to the left of the keeper in the 13th minute.

The Gryphons took the 1-0 lead into the half as both teams traded possession, with Durant having a one-shot attempt advantage at the half with six.

Durant took little time tying the game in the second half, as senior Cecil Clarke took a nice through ball from Billy Fanning and sent a shot into the back of the net off of the hands of a diving Sickles goalkeeper Brandon Stout four minutes in. The goal was Clarke's 15th of the season.

Sickles retook the lead in the 57th minute when Boris Simeunovic hit a ball from inside the keeper's box that got away from Durant's Bass.

Durant was unfazed, tying the game at 2 on a drilled far-post shot from 25 yards out by Leandro Mesquita above a leaping Stout a minute later.

The score stayed tied through regulation and went to penalty kicks, where Mesquita, Freeman Bass, Fanning and Clarke scored against Stout.

For Sickles, Simeunovic and Matta scored on the Gryphons' first two penalty kicks before Bass stopped Gonzalo Aguirre and Ben Wiley's shots.

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