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Mostly Cloudy Rebuilding Spartans show improvement
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Junior Aaron Dennis, right, leads rebuilding Elmont with five goals and one assists on the season.
Frank Koester/Herald
Each season, high school coaches must deal with replacing the graduating seniors from the previous year’s roster. There are years where the turnover isn’t all that bad, and others where the coach needs to go back to square one and rebuild the team.
At Elmont, for the past four seasons the boys’ soccer program was blessed with Ahkeel Rodney, the county’s top player and the most prolific performer in the program’s history. Rodney, now playing at the University of Virginia, had 74 goals and 52 assists for his high school career, while earning All-America honors for the Spartans.
In 2009, coach Pat Corvetti was faced with the challenge of life without Rodney and a roster filled with underclassmen. “We’re a very young team, but we’ve improved as the year has gone on,” Corvetti said. “The boys have bought into the fact that we’re rebuilding, and they’re looking forward to improving. They’re a good bunch to be around.”
The brightest spot in the lineup has been the play of center-midfielder Aaron Dennis. The junior captain has six goals and three assists. Dennis found the back of the net three times in a 5-4 home loss to Conference ABC-V rival Lawrence.
When the Spartans traveled to Lawrence, junior Dexton Smith scored twice in the second half to give Elmont a 2-2 tie. Senior Justin Matthew, and freshmen Chad Barker and Hans Avrilus have all made contributions at midfield. Senior Kenson Turenne and sophomore Ramon Robinson (two goals) have also played well.
On defense, Elmont is led by hard-working sophomore captain Shaquille Rodney at sweeper. A pair of freshmen, stopper Tim Rosario and fullback John Rogers, have improved steadily along the way. Freshman Alex Servin has had the lion’s share of the minutes in goal for Elmont. Servin had 10 saves in a 2-1 win over Malverne/East Rockaway and totaled 77 saves on the year.
Corvetti believes the team is on the right track. “We’ve definitely gotten better since the beginning of the season,” Corvetti said. “For the young guys, having the experience of playing against 17-year olds will only help us get better in the future.”
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