The Cranston East boys’ soccer team didn’t have a marquee win to its name heading into this weekend, but it did have a less-than-flattering loss and a tie on its resume.

And even though the ’Bolts looked the part of a Division III contender, wins over teams in the middle and at the bottom of the league were all they had.

That was until Friday. Now, the ’Bolts have that marquee win, and it would be hard to argue that they’re not a legitimate threat to contend.

The ’Bolts, long led by standout senior Dennis Vasquez, got a coming out party from their supporting cast, as three different players scored in a 3-1 victory over previously unbeaten Providence Country Day.

East has now won four games in a row, with the PCD victory easily the biggest. The Knights reached the semifinals in Division II last year yet still moved down to D-III. The Knights are certainly one of the top teams in the division, and East had no problem staying with them step for step and then separating themselves in the latter part of the second half.

“I’m very proud of the kids,” said East head coach Richard Grenier. “These guys were an overtime away from going to the D-II title game last year and they dropped down. We knew they were going to be one of the better teams, and they hadn’t lost all year. They came to our place and it was nice to get a victory.”

Jimmy Vang scored East’s first goal early in the second half, and after PCD tied the score with just over 12 minutes left, freshman Gabriel Sotelo scored 41 seconds later. Yojanan Santes Lopez added an insurance goal with three minutes left.

Vasquez spent the majority of the game at sweeper, where he helped shut down a potent PCD offense led by John Greene.

If there was ever a true team effort in the two years since Grenier took over as head coach at East, Friday’s win was it.

“It was a pretty good to see that with me dropping back to defense we had people up top scoring for us,” Vasquez said. “It’s pretty good to see that and I feel like that’s going to help us out in the future too.”

East improved to 5-1-1 with the victory and is tied for third in D-III with Burrillville. It trails only 6-0-1 Davies and 6-1-0 Woonsocket, a team that dropped down from D-I this year.

PCD is now 4-1-1.

The ’Bolts’ only blemishes thus far came on consecutive days, as they tied Ponaganset 2-2 on Sept. 11 and then lost 1-0 to St. Raphael the following day.

Yet, even in each of those games, East controlled play. It out-shot Ponaganset 37-9 and it put 20 shots on net against St. Ray’s, compared to just three for the Saints.

This time, against PCD, East didn’t waste its shot advantage. It wasn’t quite as lopsided, but the team still out-shot the Knights 13-9. It was a sign of growth.

“Being at the halfway mark, being 5-1-1, we would have loved to be 7-0-0 but by losing you learn a lot about yourself,” Grenier said. “Losses can really be victories in the long run because you learn so much.”

The first half was marked by back-and-forth play, with neither team finding a way to put a ball into the net. Early in the second half, East started to assert itself. Vasquez fired a shot off a set piece from 28 yards out that barely sailed over the cross bar.

A minute later, the ’Bolts took the lead. Kevin Donnelly tried to send a ball in toward the goal, but it was blocked by a PCD defender and sent out to Vang approximately 30 yards from the goal. He settled the ball, then connected on a right-footed shot using the outside of his foot, sending it into the right side of the goal, past the dive of keeper Tucker Wray.

“They’re a very impressive team,” Grenier said. “(Greene) in the middle, you’ve got to keep your eye on him at all times. But we’ve got a guy in the middle by the name of Jimmy Vang that does a real good job too.”

With Vasquez back at sweeper, and starting sweeper Patrick Finicane playing fullback along with Ayo George, East looked comfortably ahead even with the one-goal lead, as PCD rarely put pressure on the goal.

However, with 12:27 to play, Harrison Igoe controlled the ball off of a throw-in at East’s end, dribbled toward the right corner flag and lofted a perfect cross over the head of East keeper Josh Reyes and towards the back post. Ozan Cermik made a run at it and one-timed it into an open net to tie the score at one.

East immediately responded.

“When they used to score a goal on us, we used to put our heads down, even though it’s a tie,” Vasquez said. “Now we have a good mentality that as soon as they score a goal, we’ve got two minutes to just pressure, pressure, pressure.”

Off the ensuing restart, East pushed the ball up to PCD’s end, never lost it and eventually got it to Sotelo 22 yards out near the top right corner of the box. He lofted a perfect shot over the drawn out Wray into the goal to give the ’Bolts the lead again.

“That’s the key, pressuring,” Grenier said. “It seems like teams get lax after they score a goal and we went right after them. We needed that goal.”

PCD never mounted another charge, and East put the game out of reach with 3:12 to play when Tiago Pacheco slipped a pass to Kevin Pantoja – who excelled as a facilitator all night – on the goal line. Pantoja ripped a low cross through the box that Santes Lopez finished at the far post.

“Offensively, I thought Kevin really stepped up,” Grenier said. “He fed some really good balls across the line. Joel [Tolbert] and Yojanan, who ended up tucking one in, they had a lot of opportunities. You’ve got to give a lot of credit to Kevin. Kevin was really feisty in the second half.”

That ended up being the final action of the game, as East celebrated a key win at the halfway point of its season. Reyes made eight saves in net.

Optimism is high with the ’Bolts, who are ahead of last year’s pace and have had 11 different players score so far this year. Last week against Johnston, Vasquez had a pair of goals, but so did Donnelly.

It’s no longer a one-man show.

“I can move around, and we have players this year that can actually score,” Vasquez said. “They can play with each other too.”

East still has long way to go, including big games against Woonsocket, Davies and Burrillville ahead. It was scheduled to take on 1-5 North Providence on Wednesday before jumping into one of those big ones – it’s at Burrillville Friday at 3:30 p.m.