Boys soccer: Franklin reaches 100 goals in St. Edward's win

Senior AJ Franklin continued to rewrite the St. Edward record book for boys soccer on Thursday night.

Earlier this year Franklin became the school's all-time leading scorer and now he has reached another milestone with his 100th career goal. It came with 27:08 left to play and broke a 1-1 tie against visiting Lake View. Franklin added a second goal later in the game to help seal the Green Wave's 3-1 win in the semifinals of Longevity Bracket of the PepsiCo Showdown.

"It was a perfect time to get that goal," Franklin said. "It was pretty cool it was a goal that gave us the lead. I am just thankful for the opportunity to have played with some awesome guys here like Joe French and Josh Johansen, and so many others. It's been great. I feel like everything I have worked hard for has paid off."

Like so many of his previous goals, Franklin's 100th came on an assist from Johansen, who currently leads the state in assist with 22.

"Those two have just been phenomenal," St. Edward coach Tim Brieger said. "That combination has hands down given us the most potent offense we have ever had. It's great to see AJ get his 100th goal. He has just been a great player for us."

The Green Wave fell behind 1-0 against the bigger Class 2A Lake View school, but rallied to tie the score at 1-1 on a goal by Carson Scarnegnie.

"This was a tough team we faced today," Brieger said. "They came out and really challenged us. It was a good test that we really needed and we passed it. I love being able to face some tough teams that we wouldn't normally get a chance to face."

The Green Wave defense did an outstanding job of holding Lake View (4-2-1) scoreless in the second half despite losing one of their top defenders Mike Lopez to a knee injury. Freshman Eric Puquirre stepped in to fill the role.

"Mikey is our best marking back," Brieger said. "So that was a big blow. But we turned to Eric and told him it's yours the rest of the way. We need you play at Mikey's level and he did. He really shut them down. I think our depth really showed tonight with Eric stepping up and we were able to play seven or eight guys in the midfield to keep their legs fresh."

St. Edward goalkeeper Evan Sajtar had 6 saves, including 3 huge diving efforts on shots from point-blank range in the first half.

The win keeps the Green Wave, who are the top-rated Class 1A team in the state by Max Preps, undefeated at 12-0.

"It's just a good group of guys who play for each other," Brieger said.