Men's, women's soccer dominates All-Region honor roll with 11 selections

From left to right, Tessa Cost, Catherine Beazley, and Sebastian Velez were among 11 Knights selected to the NJCAA All-Region XXI soccer teams.

11/16/2023

The Community College of Rhode Island dominated the leaderboard on this year’s NJCAA All-Region XXI Men’s and Women’s Soccer Teams.

Eleven student-athletes from the college qualified – six women and five men – including freshman Tessa Cost (Greenville, RI), a First Team All-Region XXI selection and the Region XXI Co-Player of the Year.

The list of Knights representing the All-Region XXI teams is:

• Catherine Beazley (Kingston, RI), sophomore, Women’s First-Team All-Region XXI
• Tessa Cost (Greenville, RI), freshman, Women’s First-Team All-Region XXI and Region XXI Co-Player of the Year
• Hailee Manteiga (Riverside, RI), freshman, Women’s First-Team All-Region XXI
• Kylie Brito (Riverside, RI), freshman, Women’s Second-Team All-Region XXI
• Margeory Giron-Reyes (Providence, RI), freshman, Women’s Second-Team All-Region XXI
• Meadow Santos (Cumberland, RI), freshman, Women’s Second-Team All-Region XXI
• Sebastian Velez (North Providence, RI), freshman, Men’s First-Team All-Region XXI
• Cam’ron Aldana (Providence, RI), sophomore, Men’s First-Team All-Region XXI
• Ryan Paiva (Riverside, RI), freshman, All-Region XXI Honorable Mention
• Chad Parente (Bristol, RI), freshman, All-Region XXI Honorable Mention
• Andrew Jackson (Rumford, RI), freshman All-Region XXI Honorable Mention

Cost, a central midfielder, tied for the team lead in scoring with 31 points and tallied 13 assists for a team that more than doubled its win total from 2022, won its first NJCAA Division III Region XXI championship since 2014, and qualified for the NJCAA D-III National Championships for the first time since 2009. Cost shared Player of the Year honors with Bunker Hill Community College’s Eva Pitkoff. She also scored the Knights’ first national tournament goal in more than a decade in their quarterfinal matchup against Dallas College-Brookhaven.  

A team leader since the program relaunched in 2022, Beazley started all 14 of 15 games on defense and anchored a unit that allowed only two regular-season goals against Region XXI competition and finished with seven shutouts. Manteiga, also a central midfielder, tied for second on the team with 32 shots on goal, scored three times, and added six assists.

Among the Women’s Second-Team selections, Giron-Reyes finished third on the team with 24 points and tied for second with nine goals. Brito fired 32 shots on goal during the regular season and finished with 14 points in 15 starts while Santos also started all 15 games to aid the defense.

On the men’s side, Velez, a forward, led the team with nine goals – including two game-winners – and 20 points despite playing only nine games. Aldana stepped up as a sophomore leader on defense, starting 11 of the team’s 12 games. As honorable mentions, Paiva and Parente, a right-winger and center, respectively, tied for second on the team with 12 points apiece. Jackson started all 12 games and finished with two goals and a pair of assists. The Knights, who entered the season as defending Region XXI champions, finished 5-7-2 overall and. Advanced to the quarterfinals of the regional tournament.

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