Brookdale women not focused on being No. 1
Blues are top-ranked soccer team
Silence. That's Frank Lawrence's way of handling the No. 1 ranking of his Brookdale Community College's women's soccer team. Thanks to a 4-0 start, the Jersey Blues, last year's national runner-ups, were ranked No. 1 in the latest National Junior College Athletic Association poll. Along with the prestige, No. 1 also makes you the target of every team you play.

Lawrence's best way of dealing with the top ranking is to ignore it.

"I don't even bring it up," he said of the No. 1 ranking. "We don't talk about it. We focus on taking it game-togame.

"When you start off No. 2, its (No. 1) always possible," he said. "I don't focus on it this early in the season."

The focus has been on the way his team is playing and it's playing like a team that deserves its lofty ranking.

"I think realistically we're one of the top five teams in the country," Lawrence said. "We're playing well. I'm very pleased."

The 4-0 start comes despite the big influx of new players to go along with a new alignment.

"I knew it would take awhile to get used to the new alignment and new players on the field.

"We've had a different starting line-up each game," he added.

What Lawrence has is the deepest array of talent he's ever had on the Lincroft campus.

"No matter who is playing on the field, they are playing well," he remarked. "I've gone pretty deep to the bench playing all 20 players. I haven't been disappointed by anyone."

Among the newcomers, midfielder Jenna Lippi (Middletown North) defender Katie James (Howell) and sweeper Annie Peraggine (Manalapan) have been making a big impact.

"Jenna has dominated play on the field the way I though she would," said Lawrence. "Katie has been rock solid back there (on defense) reading plays and coming forward and starting the offense.

"Annie has helped settle things down in the back," he added.

The offense has been as balanced as Lawrence expected.

"We're getting contributions from a whole bunch of players," he noted.

Sophomore Johanna Lovallo (Old Bridge) leads the team in scoring with five goals and three assists and another sophomore, Liz Grimaldi (Rumson-Fair Haven) is second with four goals and three assists. Lippi leads the team in assists with five, She scorer her first career goal Thursday when the Blues beat Morris, 2-0.

Seven different players have scored a goal for Brookdale in its first for games. Including assists, the number of players scoring for BCC grows to 10.

Goalie Melissa Scaduto (Freehold Township) has lowered her goal against average to 1.496.

Brookdale opened its season winning a high-scoring game with the 2005 national champion Springfield Technical CC, 7-6. Since, then, no one has scored a goal against the Blues. In the last three games a total of six shots have been made on the Brookdale goal.

Lawrence credits part of that incredible stat to his team's depth. The Blues are wearing teams down by having fresh legs on the field at all times, He has substituted as many as five players at a time without a drop-off in talent. The last two games were scoreless at the half and then Brookdale dominated the second.

Saturday, the Jersey Blues return home for a game with Camden (noon). Brookdale will host Burlington on Tuesday (3:30 p.m.).

- Tim Morris