BANGOR, Maine — Confidence is blooming within the Bangor High School boys soccer program as the trees surrounding their home field begin to reveal their annual late summer mix of colors.
Sure, an All-American midfielder is gone from the lineup, with Carson Atherley now starting as a freshman at Division I Brown University.
Also among the graduates from the 2016 Class A state championship team is goalie George Payne, who came up big when the Rams needed him most as Bangor outlasted Gorham in penalty kicks to capture the program’s third gold ball in the last 11 years.
Now Bangor is back and may be as good as ever, with a bevy of veterans on a still youthful roster. Only three seniors start regularly and only two started during the team’s 2-1 victory over Hampden Academy on Tuesday.
Yet little complacency is to be found. Far from it, as three one-goal victories during the Rams’ 4-0 start suggest much room for improvement before those same trees around their field are barren and the cold-weather games of late October and early November provide even more championship motivation.
“[Tuesday’s] lesson was we’re going to fix our fouling issue starting with practice [Wednesday] night,” said Bangor coach Garth Berenyi, whose team survived two Hampden penalty kicks during the final four minutes of play to remain unbeaten. “It would have been a different game without the direct kicks and penalty kicks. It kills the flow of the game and in so many ways isn’t good for us.”
Yielding penalty-kick chances hasn’t been just a one-time occurrence for these Rams, who allowed a penalty-kick goal in the final seconds of their season opener against Lewiston but held on for a 3-2 victory that ended a long winless streak against the Blue Devils.
“We’ve been giving up way too many fouls,” said senior forward and captain Garth Berenyi, son of the coach. “Every time we start building momentum it seems like we give away a foul and then we have to start over.
“We take those fouls away and we’ll be very dangerous and, I think, the team to beat.”
Such a straightforward opinion isn’t confined to the Bangor locker room.
“They don’t feel like they’ve really dropped off a whole lot, so that’s pretty tough,” said Hampden coach Josh Stevens. “It’s like playing the team from last year. They move the ball so well. They have so many different weapons all over the field that they can get the field changed almost in an instant, which really puts the defense at a disadvantage.
“When they get a goal or they get on the front foot, it’s really hard to get them re-set.”
Junior captain Jake Bourassa anchors a defensive front flush with returning starters. Garth Berenyi, who shifted from midfield to forward midway through last season to help spark Bangor’s title run, teams up front with junior Colin Waterman. Senior captain Jacob Berenyi, Garth’s brother, heads up the midfield corps.
“One thing that’s definitely changed is that on 50-50 balls off goal kicks and punts we lost Carson, and Carson won 100 percent of those headers,” said Garth Berenyi. “Teams didn’t know what to do because they could put three guys in there and Carson would still win the ball.
“We’ve got some smaller guys in the middle now, but overall I say we do have a slightly better team than last year.”
Two sophomores, Jacob Monroe and Austin Conway, have stepped in to handle the goalkeeping duties though Monroe — who played in the victories over Lewiston and Camden Hills — is injured and may be sidelined for the next two weeks.
“Every game we’ve been in has been scrappy, we’ve had to fight hard for the win,” said Conway. “It’s going to be like that all season, we’re just going to have to fight.”
That’s because other teams in Class A North, and perhaps statewide, see the defending champs as a point-worthy target and the team to beat.
“We’ve seen most of the teams in the North and most of the teams in the South and we have a good squad returning,” said coach Berenyi. “We feel like we have the opportunity to take games and control our destiny but we need to keep building every game and getting 80 minutes of solid effort every time out.”
