LYNNFIELD —  You can’t say they didn’t make things interesting. Or, better put, positively nerve wracking.

With less than five minutes to play and the game clock off, the No. 2 Pioneers’ boys soccer team was seemingly in the driver’s seat with a 2-0 lead in its Elite Eight game Saturday at home against No. 7 Monument Mountain, thanks to a couple of pretty goals from junior captain Dillon Reilly. 

With the girls team having already secured its spot in the Girls Division IV Final Four a couple of hours earlier, also at Pioneer Stadium, the boys were looking to do the same.

The game appeared to be wrapped up when senior back Dylan Damiani broke up a Spartans counterattack with a long clear back to the Spartans’ 20 with under two minutes to go.

But the Spartans’ high-flying offense didn’t go down quietly. Adam Lrhazi, alone at the 30 yard-line, finally got one past Pioneer keeper Kelan Cardinal to cut the deficit to 2-1. But that was as close as the Spartans would come in this one.

“Kelan was great today and all of our defenders have been great all year long,” Lynnfield coach Brent Munroe said. “That goal we gave up in the last two minutes was the first one we gave up in the tournament. Dillon is definitely a difference-maker up top, but we are winning it with defense and I’m very happy with that. I thought they (Monument) were good. They scored seven goals against Rockland in their last game. That scared me because Rockland plays in a strong league. I just think our defense played really well.”

Senior captain Dhimitri Dono agreed.

“I thought we stayed really compact in the middle because they were better at possession than we were but we countered really well against them,” he said.

Truth be told, Cardinal kept the Pioneers in this one, making several spectacular saves from point-blank range.

“Kel made some huge saves and really saved us at times. They had a really good striker who broke through a couple of times but Kel held him off every time.” senior captain Charlie Morgan said. 

The Pioneers finally broke through in the 21st minute. Reilly turned on the jets, splitting a couple of Spartan backs and drilling a low shot just inside the far post.

The Spartans stepped up the attack. But as he’s done all year, Reilly played spoiler,  finding pay dirt on a chip shot over the goalie in the 38th minute.

“Nate (Clancy) put the ball over and the kid made a mistake and I capitalized,” Reilly said. “They had almost broken through three times, so that was a good goal to get just before the half.”

“That was a huge, huge goal,” Munroe said.

The second half was back-and-forth. The Spartans came close in the 61st minute when Mac Zdziarski, wide open in front of the net, fired a bullet only to be robbed by Cardinal’s diving save.

A few minutes later, it was Damiani who shined with a slide tackle.

“That was so clutch. He would have been clean through on goal. That would have been an easy goal but Dylan put his body on the line. He was a little hurt afterwards, but it was worth it,” Morgan said.

Munroe said senior captain Brendan Sokop also had a strong game defensively and juniors Matt Reinold and Joel Anthony played well outside. Clancy and sophomore Rocco Scenna helped the offense with one assist each.

Lynnfield’s attention is focused on its Final Four opponent, No. 3 Hampshire Regional who they will face on Tuesday at 4:30 p.m. at Doyle Field in Leominster. 

“The job’s not finished. We need to win two games but our whole team played our hearts out,” Sokop said “We’ve wanted this from the beginning of the preseason. We knew we were going to get here and this was a great performance from all of us.”

Munroe said the “scariest” part of the game was the first 15 minutes.

“We were sleepwalking and I thought we could get run out of here if we don’t wake up. That’s a very good team, but I think we also were a little bit nervous.”

This is Lynnfield’s third trip to the Final Four under Munroe. In 2006 and 2007, the Pioneers advanced to the state finals, losing heartbreakers, the first with less than 10 seconds left and the second in overtime.

“Those were great teams and fun years, but I think the competition we’re playing now is a little higher with the state-wide tournament. This is not an easy route. When we moved to D4 we thought we’d have a couple of easy games in the tournament, but we haven’t had one, so it’s been a real challenge. Our kids have worked really hard and managed to pull through and we’re still playing.”