Canton advanced to the Class S boys soccer championship game by defeating Griswold on penalty kicks Thursday night.
Joe Morelli / ScreenshotNEW BRITAIN — Canton boys soccer coach Bill Phelps had rotated his sophomore goalkeepers throughout the season. He wanted to flip-flop them again on Thursday night if the Class S state semifinal game got to penalty kicks.
But a keeper needs to be on the field during game action, so Jack Biskupiak stayed out there for penalty kicks at Veterans Stadium against Griswold.
Biskupiak came through in the clutch.
Biskupiak saved two penalty kicks and Canton made all four, propelling the No. 8 seed Warriors into the Class S championship game Sunday night 4-2 in PKs over No. 4 Griswold.
“After regulation I knew it (PKs). I feel like in overtime, it was going be tough to score, so I knew PKs was going to happen,” Biskupiak said.
It was a scoreless tie through 100 minutes of action. Biskupiak saved the penalty kicks taken by Justyn Blanchard and Evan Merchant and got his hand on the other two taken.
Devin Brown, Miles Deiulis, Ryan Weller and Mark Freedenberg all make PKs for Canton (16-4), which reached its first state final since 2003.
joseph.morelli@hearstmediact.com; @nhrJoeMorelli