WARREN – Sometimes soccer can boil down to finishing and not finishing scoring opportunities.

It’s that simple.

Novi Detroit Catholic Central only had eight shots on frame Thursday, but scored on four of them and ended up earning a 4-1 victory over host Warren De La Salle in Catholic High School League Central Division play.

The Shamrocks (7-2-2, 6-0-0), listed as honorable mention in the Division 1 polls, led 2-1 at the half before tacking on a pair of insurance tallies in the second half.

“We started off a little bit slow. But once we scored we were alright. We took advantage of a little bit of misfortune on them (with the two rebound goals). Their goalkeeper made the initial save but we followed (the shots) up and were able to score on them” noted Catholic Central coach Gene Pulice. “Thaier still has them doing a good job. And yes we did finish our opportunities tonight. I think it’s one of those things that if you can take the wind out of their sails a little. Bit. The first team to score helps you achieve that. They cut it down to 2-1 but we pulled it back a little bit in the second half with two more goals and started to get things done. “

More importantly, CC now had a two-game lead on Detroit U-D Jesuit and a three-game lead on De La Salle in the seven-school Central Division and are now comfortably in the driver’s seat in terms of winning the division and grabbing the No. 1 seed for the CHSL Bishop Tournament in October.

“We’re doing pretty good so far, and in the Catholic League they always pitch that we are one of the best leagues in the state out there. It’s a tough league and it’s a battle every game,” said Pulice. “Sometimes it’s better lucky than good. You have to respect all the teams in this league.”

Catholic Central scored the first two goals off of rebound opportunities. The first came with 24:12 still left in the first half when Luke Perry was near the doorstep to knock it home after Zachary Zahr’s first shot was knocked away by De La Salle backup goalkeeper Giovanni Vitale.

The Shamrocks scored the next goal in similar fashion when Grant Mooradian’s blast from the top of the box was knocked down by Vitale but this time it was Zahr in the right place at the right time to knock in the rebound with 19:51 remaining in the first half.

Andrew Corder finally got the Pilots untracked when he found some open real estate near the upper left corner of the box and uncorked a banger from 18 yards out with 17:27 left in the first half. It was Corder’s 21st goal of the season just one month into the campaign.

But Catholic Central had four opportunities in the second half and two were converted by Mooradian. The first came with 34:58 remaining in the game when Peters found Mooradian unmarked in the middle of the box and ripped a 14-yard banger into the net.

Mooradian later converted a penalty kick with 28:06 left to cap the scoring and open up a three-goal lead.

Defensively, Catholic Central did a great job on limiting Corder’s chances, allowing him only three shots on goal. Goalkeeper Jake Sievers turned aside a laser shot by Corder midway through the second half and finished with four saves for CC.

Catholic Central held a 12-11 overall shots advantage in the somewhat evenly- game and also had a 8-5 shots on goal advantage in the contest. De La Salle held a 4-2 edge off corners.

De La Salle, ranked third in the state in Division 2, slipped to 10-3-0 overall and 3-3-0 in league play. Although the Pilots are essentially out of the Central Division race and only Detroit U-D Jesuit can possible catch the Shamrocks.

“Hats off to CC. The better team won tonight. They outplayed us and scored on their opportunities,” said Thaier Mukhtar, whose team in the defending Division 2 state champion and reached the state semifinals in 2023. “They should win the (Central) and we can’t catch him. But there is still a lot for us to play for. We have to get better and get ready for the state tournament and try to go as far as we can. The ultimate goal is to win the state championship.

“This wasn’t one of our better games,” added Mukhtar. “We just got outplayed by CC tonight. We’ll bounce back.”

ROCHESTER HILLS – This time around there was no drama for Rochester Adams.

After defeating Romeo in overtime in the season opener last season, 22-21 — the winning points were scored courtesy of a 2-point conversion toss — Rochester Adams picked up little resistance Thursday with a resounding 39-7 victory over visiting Romeo in the season opener for both teams.

Adams never trailed and picked up great balance offensively. The Highlanders racked up 403 yards of offense while allowing Romeo to amass just 231 yards on the night.

Three players did a lot of the damage, with senior quarterback Ryland Watters finishing a perfect 5-for-5 passing for 112 yards with two touchdown passes while rushing for 67 yards on 11 carries with two more touchdowns. Senior Matt Toeppner had six carries for 35 yards and hauled in three catches for 87 yards and two scores, and junior Lorenzo Sartor rushed for 118 yards on 11 carries to go along with a catch for 15 yards.

The Highlanders, state semifinalists last season, racked up 127 passing yards and 276 rushing yards using a wide variety of ball carriers (seven) and receivers (three) on the night.

The early lead set the tone and the Highlanders picked up steam.

“A thousand percent,” said veteran Adams coach Tony Patritto of his team’s start. “Toeppner has always been a great player for us. He emerged during the second half of last season for us. He had a great camp. He a tough kid — he has a great burst running. He never takes a down off. He’s a throwback.

“But we have a lot of kids who can makes players. That’s who we are. It could be someone different each game,” added Patritto.

Romeo graduated all of its defensive starters and brought back just four players that started games last year on the offensive side of the ball. The inexperience showed against a state powerhouse program in Rochester Adams.

“We don’t return much in terms of starters,” admitted Romeo coach Curt Rienas. “We don’t have any defensive starters back and just four players that started some games for us last season on offense. We have a lot of new players in there tonight. It showed. We fell behind early.

“And no, we did not recover,” added Rienas. “We replaced a lot of guys and we played very hesitant tonight. And Adams is a very good football team with a lot of experience and it showed. We can’t play hesitant against a team with that type of caliber like Adams. We have lots of room for improvement.”

Senior quarterback Sammy Nepa finished 10-for-15 passing for 115 yards for Romeo before exiting the game late in the second quarter. Junior running back Troy Smith had two catches for 59 yards and also rushed for 20 yards on seven carries and scored the lone touchdown on the ground for the Bulldogs (0-1).

Junior Brady Lindstrom and senior Liam Bullock had fumble recoveries for Adams, with Bullock’s strip and recovery helping set up the Highlanders’ second touchdown that gave them a 17-0 advantage three plays later. Defensively, the Highlanders dominated while offensively Adams controlled the line of scrimmage despite having just three starters check in at over 200 pounds and having just one returning offensive lineman back in uniform from the Division 1 Final Four team.

“We’re not very big, but we make up for it,” said Patritto. “I remember in 2005 a long time ago our biggest player was our quarterback but we were still able to win a lot of games that season. He weighed 205 pounds.”

After forcing Romeo to punt on its first series, Toeppner hauled in a short pass from Watters and raced 60 yards on Adams’ first play from scrimmage for the 7-0 lead with 8:39 still to go in the first quarter. Junior Nolan Grahn nailed the extra point and also booted a 24-yard field goal with 1:47 remaining in the first quarter for a 10-0 advantage.

Watters, a Ferris State University commit, scored on a 16-yard sweep with 3:20 left in the half to move the lead up to 17-0.

Romeo finally got untracked late in the second quarter when Smith scored on a 3-yard run with 45 seconds remaining in the half to trim the deficit down to 17-7.

Adams responded in a flash, putting together a swift three-play drive that was capped by a Watters 25-yard TD strike to Toeppner with 19 ticks left in the half to push the advantage up to 24-7 by the break.

In the second half, Adams controlled the clock and picked up two more scoring drives. Watters scored on a 1-yard plunge and Watters hit Jesse Geottes with a 2-point conversion pass for a 32-7 lead with 6:18 still left in the third stanza. Lindstrom, the backup quarterback, capped the scoring with a 32-yard touchdown run up the middle with 4:40 to play. Grahn added four extra points.

 

 

ALLEN PARK — Ohio State defensive line coach Larry Johnson doesn’t want to set the bar too high for the Detroit Lions’ newest draft pick.

But he kind of did anyway.

After Lions general manager Brad Holmes compared Tyleik Williams, the 28th pick in Thursday night’s NFL Draft, to Alim McNeill, Johnson said Williams’ traits remind him of someone else: Future first-ballot Hall-of-Famer Aaron Donald.

“Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying he’s Aaron Donald, but his movements skills, like to be able to change directions — Aaron Donald’s really good at doing what we call a jab-olé, inside-outside, and then he can go power,” Johnson said Friday on a conference call with local reporters. “I think Tyleik’s got the same kind of movement because he can go power, he can go finesse if given the opportunity.

“Aaron Donald’s in a league by himself. I don’t want to put that pressure on Tyleik going into the league. But there are some things that he does — Aaron Donald does real easy, and Tyleik has that same kind of movement skills. But Aaron Donald’s a really special player. I don’t think there’s many guys like him.”

Put another way: You can go a long time without seeing a 6-foot-3, 334-pound tackle who moves quite like Williams does. Which is why, even though Williams was more of a run-stuffer in college, there seems to be a high level of confidence from all parties that he’ll be able to become a legitimate pass rusher in the NFL.

“Two things that jump right off the bat is his initial quickness off the ball, and for a big guy to be able to bend and turn corners like he does, it’s just unprecedented. You just don’t do that very easily,” Johnson said, adding that his first impression of Williams was watching him run a 4.9-second 40-yard dash at 340 pounds.

“His get-off is real wicked, and he’s got strong, violent hands, and he understands the pass sets and the run sets. I think that’s really important recognition of what he sees, and Tyleik is really one of the best players I’ve seen to be able to do that. … But his twitch, man, it’s God-given. He had it and he used it to his advantage.”

Amidst yet another round of discussions about whether Holmes could have gotten his first-round pick (in this case, Williams) later in the draft, Williams said the Buffalo Bills’ front office told him they were going to take him with the 30th pick if he was still on the board.

“They kind of told me if I was there, they wanted me,” Williams said.

Besides his athleticism being off the charts for a man of his size, Johnson called him a “very high-character guy” who will endear himself to teammates through his personality and the way he studies the game.

“He has a way of picking up (the offense’s) signals. Zoro could be left, or Cowboy could be right. He would understand exactly where the ball is going. He’d start telling the guys, ‘It’s going right, it’s going right. It’s going left, it’s going left,’” Johnson recalled. “He would come to the sideline and say, ‘Coach, here’s their signals. Here’s their calls. Here’s their run-game calls.’ … He wants to know where the ball is going.”

In an era where college players transfer schools like they’re changing lanes on the freeway, Williams played all four seasons for the Buckeyes, finally achieving the ultimate goal of winning the national title this past January.

While there couldn’t have been many Lions fans who were happy to see Williams’ Buckeyes win the national title, his championship pedigree is undoubtedly a bonus for his next team, which is also on the cusp of greatness. Williams brought it in the postseason, recording 13 pressures over four College Football Playoff games with 14 tackles (three for loss).

“I’ve been through hard games — of course, it’s not the same as the NFL,” Williams acknowledged during his visit to Allen Park on Friday. “I’ve played Texas, Notre Dame, Oregon — I’ve played all those top teams who have these top players. I’ve gone against these guys my whole college career and I’ve had great games against all of them.”

Johnson said Williams got better as the lights got brighter.

“That’s the thing about Tyleik I love about him. He’ll come to the sideline and he’ll have a moment when I see it, and say, ‘It’s time to go, man, it’s time to open the game,’” Johnson said. “He’s done it in so many different big games.”

Williams must admit that feeling welcome in the state of Michigan will take some getting used to. After spending four seasons at Ohio State, Williams is ready to leave behind his disdain for that state up north.

“I’ve learned to hate this state for the last four years, but getting drafted here, I’m just happy. I can put all that behind me. Of course, it’s still the team up north — I’m still not going to say it,” Williams said.

“But I’m just happy I’m here.”

By all accounts, the Lions should be extremely happy he’s here, too.