Comets Crush B-52s

The Missouri Comets continued their undefeated streak on Saturday night with a resounding 13-3 victory over the visiting Wichita B-52s. Leo Gibson continued his scoring streak with two goals on the night, but defender Brian Harris was the star of the night, scoring four goals on his former teammate, Boris Pardo.

Coming off a tough, come-from-behind victory against the Milwaukee Wave last week, the Comets came out firing tonight. Offensively over-matched, Wichita tried to weather the early storm to keep themselves within reach.

Early on it worked, the Comets controlled possession all over the field, but Wichita was able to collapse their defense into the box and clog the shooting lanes. Former Kansas City Wizard and Comets goalkeeper Boris Pardo was able to smother anything that did sneak through.

It took nearly ten minutes for the Comets to get their first score with Alain Matingou. The french forward was in the right place after Pardo spilled a shot from Gibson. Less than a minute later, Harris started his night with a toe poke shot from outside the faded arc left over from the multiple point scoring system.

Wichita didn't get their first shot on goal until the final few minutes of the first half. In the meantime, Max Touloute scored two (including one short-handed) while Coady Andrews and Bryan Perez added to the Comets total.

The shutout was broken in the final two minutes of the first half. Daniel Sach jumped on a loose ball at the top of the arc and caught Danny Waltman offguard, but by that time, his side was already down 6-1.

Brian Harris took over in the second half. Earlier, he and Byron Alvarez had battled in the corner before the latter shoved Harris into the wall, causing  his eye to cut open and forcing him out of the game for a short while.

The former Comets captain spent the rest of the night regretting that foul as it seemed to waken up a sleeping giant in Harris. He controlled his defensive third of the field, shutting down Wichita's leading two leading scorers, Alvarez and Kevin TenEyck.

"Getting smashed on the boards was like a rude awakening," said Harris. "It opened up the beast inside of me, just woke something up. I was going to play hard regardless, but I think that just gave me more of a push."

Brian Harris watches his first goal drop into the upper corner

Offensively Harris started the second half by carrying the ball the length of the field before turning Alvarez completely around and beating Pardo with another long-distance shot to the upper corner of the net. He followed that up with two more to finish his career-best game.

Wichita was able to score twice in the second half, but they were never really threatening to the Comets as the difference between the former PASL and MISL teams was once again on display.

Following the game, the game's Man of the Match found more meaning in his four-goal performance.

"Actually, it's my four year anniversary with my girlfriend, so it's extra special to have four goals. She's always been a big supporter, so deep down inside I wanted to get to four goals."

Head coach Vlatko Andonovski wasn't surprised with his defender's performance. "I knew he was capable of scoring a lot of goals...it showed tonight. In fact, every single one of them is capable of scoring three or four goals."

Andonovski may be proven correct next week when his undefeated Comets travel to face the 0-3 Harrisburg Heat. The young season has not been kind to the Heat. They have yet to win and are coming off a 27-0 drubbing at the hands of the Baltimore Blast (although that game was scored using the Multiple Point Scoring system). The Comets will enter that game with the league's best goal differential at +27 while Harrisburg is near the bottom of the list with -21.