Smithtown West boys soccer on to finals after shootout win

Smithtown West boys soccer on to finals after shootout win

In a bitterly fought match that went scoreless for 100 minutes of regulation and overtime, the Smithtown West Bulls beat the Northport Tigers, 1-0, in the Suffolk County boys soccer semifinal on Monday. The game was decided by penalty kicks — the last of which coming from a surprising source.

In a game that saw five yellow cards and countless hard tackles and collisions, West goalkeeper Landon Schneider came out of his net, where he played brilliantly the entire match, to score the game-winning penalty kick. After five successful penalty kicks by both teams, Northport missed on its sixth attempt.

Having been replaced in goal for the penalty kicks by backup Brendan Madden, Schneider stepped in for the sixth and game-winning kick and calmly drilled it into the left side of the net.  

Schneider and Northport goalkeeper Tommy Pace both made a number of acrobatic saves, but none was better than Schneider’s save of Richie Bender’s point-blank blast in the 95th minute that would have been a sudden-death victory for Northport.

Smithtown West (12-4-1) will now battle Connetquot (14-2-3) for the Suffolk AA Championship on Thursday Night at Comsewogue High School. Northport finished 12-6-1 on the year.