Snoqualmie Valley Sports Journal Archive Edition

            Mount Si’s boys’ soccer team played at home for the first time in two weeks last night, and the guys sure were happy to be home.

             Alex Censullo scored twice as the Wildcats maintained their third place position in Kingco 3A, scoring a 3-0 win over the Liberty Patriots, a team which beat Mount Si earlier this season.

            “I like the way we looked tonight,” said Mount Si coach Darren Brown, who told the SVSJ his team tried a new formation, called the 4-4-2 diamond middle. The formation utilized a lot of senior forward Eric Baumgardner, and his play was key.”He’s just phenomenal,” Brown said. “Eric was just sensational.”

            The Wildcats’ first goal was in the 10^th minute, and it was delivered by the Humboldt State-bound player, off a feed from junior Dane Aldrich, who had two assists. Aldrich also assisted on Censullo’s first tally, in the 16^th minute. “I was kind of in the right place at the right time on that one. It was just a good run by Dane and then it rebounded (and) I just put it in,” Censullo said.

            The sophomore then closed it out in the 60^th minute taking a rebound from Baumgardner and pounding it into an empty net. “(It was a) good ball from Eric and I just tried to beat the keeper and then had to finish it off on the rebound,” Censullo said. The Wildcat midfielder, who also runs on the cross country team in the fall, was thrilled with his overall efforts. “It was really good to kind of get the monkey off my back,” he said.

            Wildcat senior midfielder Morgan Popp also got a couple nice chances to score in the second half; the opportunities, though, went for naught. Popp next week is expected to sign a letter of intent to play men’s soccer at Hawaii-Hilo, a Division II school on the big island of Hawaii. Once done, Popp will join Baumgardner and former keeper Ryan Herman (Santa Clara) as class of 2011 signees from the Wildcat boys’ soccer program. Nearly 20 MSHS seniors from several sports have signed college letters of intent this school year to various two and four-year schools, by far a school record. This list is led by Herman and girls’ soccer star Alexis Pearlstein (Ball State), two of six who signed Division I scholarships.

            Mount Si is home Tuesday night against Sammamish, who currently is leading the league and is ranked. The Wildcats’ chances of a strong postseason run pretty much require a win in this contest, so Mount Si will be ready for sure. Game time is 7:30 p.m.