The Red Rovers came to Memorial Field looking to knock off the top-seeded Hornets in the Eastern Pennsylvania Conference boys soccer tournament and left being eliminated when Emmaus put together two goals in just over 30 seconds to beat Easton 2-0. The win advances Emmaus into the semifinals and a rematch with Parkland for the right to play in the EPC Championship Thursday night.

After playing scoreless soccer for 97-minutes, Mitch Sterkenberg went up high on a corner kick and headed the ball past goalie Ben Boothe to give Emmaus a 1-0 lead. The goal was the first of the season for the junior defenseman, who has slowly, but surely shown what he can do when he's on the field.

"Mitch has had a real good week or two of practice and he's earned minutes late, because we've noticed his work ethic and that's really where he's at his best when he can get in there and be aggressive and I was glad to see he found one," said Emmaus head coach John Cari. "His hard work paid off, that's what that is."

While Sterkenberg may not be used to scoring goals, junior John Fritz is. In fact, Fritz recently set the school's record for goals in a season when he scored three times in the season finale against Central Catholic. Just 33 seconds after Sterkenberg got his first, Fritz notched his 29th goal of the season to put the Hornets up 2-0.

Cari also credited the work ethic of Fritz for allowing him to become the prolific scorer that he has become this season. Cari knew Fritz was a hard worker and a good player, but not long ago, he would have been surprised if you had told him just how good Fritz would be this season.

"If you asked me at the beginning of the year, it would be a big surprise, but watching how he's progressed, no, it's not a big surprise. It's been really wonderful and he's been a great kid and such a hard worker," said Cari. "It's been wonderful, he's a really great kid and he works so hard. It's 100 miles per hour toward the goal every time, he wants it, but he's not a selfish kid and he's very humbled by it and he's been wonderful to coach. I'm very proud of him."

After having a nine-game shutout streak broken, the Hornets allowed a single goal in back-to-back games, but they've rebounded with two straight shutouts since then. Senior goalkeeper Ethan Lang has been a big part of the success of the Emmaus defense, even though he credits the rest of the defensive unit with making his job easy.

"The defense is probably one of the strongest parts of our team," Lang said. "Considering that we lost a lot of seniors last year from our defensive line, I felt that everybody came in and played really well this year. I couldn't ask for a better defense. I haven't had to make many saves this year and I'm really glad that I have them in front of me."

Even though he's quick to credit his teammates with the team's success at holding opponents scoreless, Lang is the last line of defense. He admitted that the quick goals by his teammates took a lot of pressure of his shoulders.

"It was a relief," said Lang. "In a game that is this tight and zero-zero for a really long time, it can come down to just one goal and the fact that we got two back-to-back in 30 seconds just took the pressure right off of us and we got really comfortable. We were able to get on them a lot more."