The Newburgh Free Academy girls’ soccer team played two games to start their season last week and won them both.

They finished the week with a 7-0 win over Middletown in their Orange County Interscholastic Athletic Association Division I opener on Thursday at NFA North.

“We played the whole 80 minutes without having any letdowns,” Newburgh coach Dave Doulin said. “That is our main goal coming into the game to put a good solid 80 minutes.”

That, and to score quickly.

“We scrimmaged them earlier in this year and didn’t score for 30 minutes so our goal today was to score in the first 10 or 15 minutes,” Doulin said.

It took less than six for Newburgh (2-0, 1-0 OCIAA-I) to get on the board as Bryanna Foti scored the first of her three goals to put the Goldbacks on the board.
About 12 minutes later, eighth-grader Marina Parodo scored off a cross from Mikayla Podlas.

“That really did boost our confidence because when it’s 2-0, and then we scored five more goals, it brought our heads up,” Foti said.

The Goldbacks tacked on a pair of goals to finish out the first half when Maddy Noble scored off an assist from Podlas in the 30th minute and then Emily Giron scored unassisted in the 37th.

The score wasn’t all one sided, as Newburgh put so much pressure on the Middies’ defense that their own goalkeeper – Isabella Leggett – only touched the ball once.

“She didn’t have to do as much,” Foti said. “Our defense was very good. We moved the ball back and forth. We played up. The ball never passed midfield.”

Newburgh continued to maintain possession throughout the second half and scored in quick succession in the 42nd, 44th and 46th minute to put the game to bed.
Sierra Ramirez scored off an assist from Wendy Guerra, while Foti added her final two goals, one assisted by Podlas and the other by Guerra.

“Our passing was very good today,” Foti said. “It wasn’t long balls. We played very short passes. We were very quick on our toes and had a lot of communication today.”

And now, they have two ins in their first two games. They were scheduled to play a non-league game at Cornwall on Monday before playing host to the Valley Central Vikings on Thursday.

“It’s a good first two games to get going,” Doulin said. “We’ve got our first league win under our belt. Moving forward we’ve got two tough games next week.”