Flashy Benedictine turns away Wickliffe

Benedictine grabbed a two-goal advantage by the 10th minute and recorded a 5-2 victory over visiting Wickliffe on Oct. 4 in an allarea nonconference clash at dusk.

Nahun Figueroa scored a pair of goals for the Bengals (11-4), who recorded 14 shots on target and nine corners and showed flashes why they can be one of the area’s most fun sides to watch in the offensive third.

“I told these guys to stay aggressive,” Benedictine coach Miguel Cora said. “We’re coming off a real tough game (a 4-3 loss Oct. 2 at West Geauga), so we had a lot of heart. We had a lot of intensity – stayed aggressive. We possessed, and we were able to attack.

“So I like the way we played today. It was very encouraging going into the playoffs.”

The Bengals, who debuted at No. 9 in this past week’s Top of the Crop, took a 1-0 lead in the sixth minute on an own goal, then pushed the advantage to 2-0 on a lovely natural flow of attack tally in the 10th.

Andrew Schiffer delivered a pacey through ball for Anthony Cora. Cora chipped to the edge of the box for Figueroa, who made no mistake with a rightfooted strike upper-90 and near post.

In the 23rd minute, Christian Cora, the area’s leading scorer in 2018 with 34 goals and 11 assists coming into the match, was sprung by Schiffer service and had an initial look turned away. But Justin Mitchell banged home the rebound to open a 3-0 halftime lead.

Nick Colbert gave the Blue Devils (7-5-1) a brief lifeline at 3-1 with a finish in the 42nd minute, his 14th goal of the fall. But Anthony Cora essentially iced the result in the 52nd, collecting a diagonal through ball from his freshman brother Christian and slotting an effort wide right.

“We started out pretty strong,” Anthony Cora said. “We got some good looks in there. Second half, we kind of started out a little slowly with that early goal. It kind of put us on our heels a little bit, but I think we played pretty hard.

We’re playing with five freshmen – a freshman goalie, a freshman forward who’s doing outstanding.”

Coming soon

For more from this match, including a profile of Anthony Cora as he gamely plays on in his junior campaign with a major knee injury, check back in the coming days on NewsHerald.com and in our print edition.