The Tacoma Stars opened the 2018-2019 Major Arena Soccer League season with a resounding win over the visiting Turlock Express. The Stars had a crowd of 3,437 on had to witness the home opener and they got an attacking show with nine scorers.
Result: Tacoma 12 - Turlock 2
The Stars started the 2018-2019 campaign tacking up a 12 spot on Turlock. Tacoma had nine different goal scorers, two with multi-goal nights. Three Tacoma players collected multiple points. Tacoma never trailed in the game that dropped Turlock to 0-2 after their loss on Friday night to the Ontario (CA) Fury. The Stars twelve goals give them a one goal advantage over said Fury, after Ontario posted eleven goals in that win over Turlock on last Friday night.
Goal scorers: Nick Perera 3, Philip Lund 2, Chase Hanson, James Riley, Jamael Cox, Vince McCluskey, Joey Gjertsen, Adam West, Matt Clare
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Quotes
Head Coach Darren Sawatzky
On the win
“Everything we do is about us, and I thought the guys executed on a lot of things we worked on. I think we gave up goals that were created by our mistakes.”
On James Riley
“James is a excellent soccer player and he is adapting quickly.”
On Nick Perera’s seven point night
“Nick is our main target and we will need him on the scorers sheet if we are going to win anything.”
On Dallas this coming Friday
“They are very good MASL teams and we need to get dialed in.”
Defender James Riley
Riley on his First MASL game
“Fantastic, the crowd was great, we appreciate the support. The team played well, we executed well. We have a lot for Turlock, they had a disadvantage of playing last night then traveling here, we wanted to have a good tempo, and just control what we could control.”
On his first MASL Goal
“Perera is fantastic, Coach said to run off of him and we worked on that in training. He gave me a perfect ball and I just needed to keep it on frame.”
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Stats
Shots: Tacoma out shot Turlock 27-4 in the game — 18 of those came in the first half.
League Leaders (Offense): Nick Perera leads the league in assists picking up 4. Nick is tied for third in goals with 3.
League Leaders (Goalkeeping): Goalkeeper Danny Waltman is second in the league with a 2.00 goals against average.
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Weekly awards
Nick Perera was named to the Major Arena Soccer League Team of the week His first of 2018-2019 season.Looking Ahead
Looking Ahead
The Tacoma Stars now look forward to a visit from the Dallas Sidekicks, on Friday December 7. Dallas is tied for first in the Southwest Division with the Monterrey Flash. Both clubs are 1-0. Dallas took a narrow 5-4 victory over Rio Grande Valley. The Stars know that Dallas will provide it own unique challenges. Dallas will provide a challenging offense and defense for the Stars players to work against. Kick off on Friday will be at 7:35 and Tickets are available at this link.