Waterford — More than one person on the Waterford boys' soccer sideline was mystified by how senior Alex Ard managed to thread the ball past Bacon Academy defenders to set up Monday's game-winning goal.

Ard wasn't quite sure how he did it either.

Ard passed the ball right to left through traffic to sophomore Matias Arcelus, who scored from about 10 yards out with over 15 minutes remaining to break a tie and give third-seeded Waterford a 2-1 win over the sixth-seeded Bobcats in the first round of the Eastern Connecticut Conference Region I postseason experience.

"I just heard him and I played it," Ard said. "I trust him. ... You've got to trust your teammates. He'll finish it. That was huge."

Waterford (8-5) will play at No. 2 Ledyard (7-4) in Wednesday's semifinals at 4 p.m. The teams split two regular season meetings — Ledyard won 3-1 on Oct. 10; the Lancers won 3-2 on Oct. 21.

The ECC is holding three regional tournaments in lieu of its usual Division I and II format because of the COVID-19 pandemic. It had used regional scheduling during the abbreviated fall regular season, too.

Waterford last won an ECC postseason game on Oct. 28, 2013 when it beat Lyman Memorial, 4-0, in the quarterfinals.

"It's massive to come out and win this one," Ard said. "It's an icebreaker."

It's also Waterford's first winning season since 2016.

"These boys that have been here (for a while), they've reached some milestones," second-year Lancers head coach Josh Bessette said. "Beating Ledyard was a big win for us this year. We're happy to be able to be a good enough team to play them again.

"The boys are really coming together for each other. It's been a crazy year, but they're just doing it for each other."

Ard scored and junior goalkeeper Tim Silva, in his fifth full game as a starter, had five saves.

Senior Jayden Guerra scored and classmate Owen Burton had seven saves for Bacon (2-9).

It was the third time in four games Waterford beat the Bobcats this season.

"We played well," Bacon head coach Skip Starks said. "I'm happy with the boys in a lot of respects, but finishing has been a problem since day one and we work on it a lot."

Ard gave Waterford the initial lead on a penalty kick 13 minutes, 16 seconds into the game.

The lead didn't last long as Guerra shot right-to-left with the ball hitting the left post and going into the net at 15:15.

Arcelus scored the game-winner in the 65th minute.

"I can't wait to see that (Monday night) when I'm breaking down the film," Bessette said. "I don’t know what was better — the run that (Ard) saw (Arcelus), (or) that (Ard) sliced the ball through. And it’s a good finish for Arcelus. He hasn’t had a lot of those this year, but it was good for his confidence moving forward. We had the angle on the ball. It was just something pretty."

Bacon had two corner kicks in the final 12 minutes, the last which happened in the final seconds, but couldn't score. Silva had a save on the last one.

"That sums up the season right there — capitalizing on chances," Starks said. "We don't necessarily give up a lot of chances. We play pretty crisp, but it seems like the other teams always capitalizes better than we do."

n.griffen@theday.com