Butler, Oliveira lead Mariner United to Division 1 Championship!

John Butler and Ryan Oliveira saved their best games for the biggest

games of the season and led our boys to our first SCSL League Championship on Saturday afternoon in Dighton. In our first round 5-0 win against Westport, Remy, George and Marmello got us the lead with some impressive strikes and then John Butler moved to offense and sealed the deal with a pair of highlight film goals. He was on fire and we will be counting on him to help lead our offense in the spring. Great job John! Great players play their best in the biggest games! And you picked our offense up and provided a spark at the most important point of the season! Our defense was also immense in game 1. Curly has to be one of the best defenders in the state in my opinion! I haven't seen a defensive player as good as him in SCSL or Maple over the past 3 years. And he was dominant all day for us! Tres is another one who played his best games of the season on Saturday. He has gone from a solid rec player to defensive all-star in less than a year! He works hard every practice and every game and is one of the nicest boys I have ever had the pleasure of coaching! Vincent has been playing more offense all season but when we wanted to shut down our opponents and win a championship he gladly and unselfishly took one for the team and gave the Westport and Falmouth attacks fits all day long. His versatility makes him a very valuable player for us. When they did get a shot on Ryan he was in the right position and played with a confidence and aggressiveness that you need in a big game. He saved EVERY shot that he saw on Saturday which is very difficult to do. Two shutouts in the two biggest games of the season? If I had some game balls to give out Ryan would have gotten one of them! Great job buddy!

In the 2nd game we were surprised to be facing Falmouth. They pulled a huge upset earlier in the day by beating the undefeated DR Strikers in overtime. Once again our defense was lights out and Ryan took care of any shots that got through. Curly got the Championship game winner with an awesome free kick! How many clutch free kick goals does he have for us over the years? THATS why I let him take all the free kicks! The goal that put it away and gave us all a little breathing room was one of the prettiest goals of the season. A perfect pass from Butler to Anthony and another perfect pass to George bang-bang-bang GOAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAL!!! Game, set, match, point!

Honorable mention to Christian for playing tough all day. He was passing the ball and moving to space and winning 50-50 balls all day long!

Cole, Coby, and Felix played hard and continued to give us a spark off the bench just as they did all season.

All of your parents and Mike and I are very proud of all of our boys! CONGRATULATIONS on a spectacular season!!!

Mariner on 3... ONE....TWO...THREE...