A Family Tradition
Once the celebrations died down following Annandale United’s U18 Boys State Cup victory, an interesting fact came light. Brian Breslin, AUFC’s goalkeeper became the third member of his family to win a Virginia State Cup Championship with Annandale. Both of his parents, Laura Ferrantino (Breslin) and Sean Breslin had also won state championships for the club in the 70’s.
Laura spent her first few years of travel soccer playing for the Springfield Rangers Boys travel team before joining the newly formed Annandale Americans Girls team as a defender. The Americans won the State Cup Championship in both the ’75-76 and ’76-77 seasons and Sean Breslin, a forward on the talented Annandale Spartan Boys team helped the squad win the State Cup Championship in the ’74-’75 season.
Laura and Sean would meet later in school and were married after graduating from George Mason University. The Breslin’s had three boys, including Brian, their middle son.
Brian, a member of the AUFC 96 Boys team that was a finalist in the 2012 and 2013 State Cup Championships and is currently ranked 5th in the nation, played a big role in helping the team win it all in 2014. His biggest performance came in the semi finals against a determined VA Legacy squad. Annandale led 1-0 and was comfortably controlling the game before a red card mid way through the first half reduced the team to 10 players. Although Annandale was unlucky not to score again (hitting the posts twice), Brian came up with several big saves, including a 1v1 stop and a tremendous reaction save late in the game to preserve the 1-0 victory for Annandale.
In the final, Brian anchored a defense that earned another shut out with a 4-0 win against local rival, Braddock Road. During the team’s state cup run, Annandale scored 20 goals while conceding only 2. When the final whistle blew in the Championship, neither Brian’s teammates nor his coaches realized that Brian had been competing for a higher purpose – to continue his family’s tradition of winning State Cup Championships for Annandale.