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Photo by
Juan Velez.
Cesar Castillo fed the ball to sophomore
Luis Gonzalez to score the first goal
against Mt. San Antonio. |
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For the first 90
minutes and an inexplicable seven minutes of extra
time, the Cerritos College men's soccer team had
outplayed rival Mt. San Antonio College in every
facet of the game. Staked to a 2-0 first half lead,
the Falcons surrendered a goal when the defense
pulled up looking for an offside call, while the
game-tying goal came in the eighth minute of extra
time in the second half. The tie puts the Falcons at
12-1-2 overall and 6-1-1 in South Coast Conference
play, while the Mounties are now 12-0-2 overall and
7-0-1 in the SCC. The tie puts Mt. San Antonio in
the driver's seat for the conference title over
Cerritos. The team will look to recover from the
game when they travel to Pasadena City College for a
2:00 p.m. game next Tuesday.
"I am so proud of
the way our team played today and it's a shame that
they can't feel better about it," said a very angry
head coach
Benny
Artiaga. "This was the best game any
Cerritos team has played on this field and all I can
tell the guys is to try and hold their heads up
because they played a great 90 minutes - which is
all they were supposed to play."
The Falcons took
it right to the Mounties from the outset and
attacked using their speed. They got a quick goal in
the eighth minute when freshman
Cesar
Castillo (Eagle Valley, CO HS)
stole the ball in the corner from Adrian Padilla and
dribbled the ball along the baseline. Castillo then
smartly fed the ball to sophomore
Luis
Gonzalez (Long Beach Millikan HS),
who scored into an open corner of the net past Mt.
SAC goalkeeper Christopher Lara.
Cerritos increased
their lead to 2-0 in the 27th minute on a header
from sophomore
Paul Montalvo (La Sierra HS)
after a crossing pass from Gonzalez. After pushing
the ball deep into Mountie territory, Gonzalez sent
a high ball to Montalvo, who's header appeared to
knuckle, as it got past Lara for a goal.
Throughout the
game, the Falcons controlled the tempo and had Mt.
San Antonio on their heels. The defense, led by
sophomores Montalvo,
Timmy Seo
(Los Alamitos HS) and
Fabian
Perez (Bellflower HS) shut
down an explosive Mountie team, while freshman
goalkeeper
Danny Lizama (Duarte HS) made
several big saves. The same can be said for Lara,
who turned away Cerritos several times, including
sophomore
Salvador Melendrez (Long Beach
Millikan HS) in the 10th minute and Gonzalez a
minute later.
A gutsy move by
the Falcons backfired late in the game, as Aaron
Salazar found himself all along going in on Lizama
when the defense was looking for an offside call.
That, along with the extra time that the official
allowed on the clock were the only times Cerritos
was not in complete control of the game.
"I've never seen a
college game officiated like that," said Artiaga.
"I'm so very proud of our team and the way they
played. We did what we set out to do today and we're
going to take this experience and use it as
motivation for the rest of the season."
Scoring
1st 2nd F
Mt. San Antonio
0 2 2
Cerritos
2 0 2
Goals:
Mt. San Antonio:
Aaron Salazar (84th minute), Spencer Jones (90th
minute).
Cerritos: Luis
Gonzalez (8th minute, Cesar Castillo assist), Paul Montalvo
(27th minute, Luis Gonzalez assist).
Shots on Goal:
Mt. San Antonio: 6
Cerritos: 16
Keeper Saves:
Mt. San Antonio:
Christopher Lara (7 saves)
Cerritos: Danny Lizama
(3 saves)
Records:
Mt. San Antonio:
12-0-2 Overall, 7-0-1 South Coast Conference (Ranked
#1 Nationally)
Cerritos: 12-1-2
Overall, 6-1-1 South Coast Conference (Ranked #3
Nationally)
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