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Photo by
Juan Velez.
Mayra Garcia looks to score against LA
Pierce College in playoff action Tuesday.
Cerritos won 3-0. |
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Photo
Gallery |
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With constant
pressure being put on the Los Angeles Pierce College
goalkeeper, the Cerritos College women's soccer team
finally broke a scoreless tie with two goals in the
first half of their Southern California Regional
Playoff 2nd Round game at Cerritos on Tuesday
afternoon. The Falcons (19-0-4), ranked #1 in the
playoffs, who went on to post a 3-0 win, their
second of the playoffs, advance to the third round
on Saturday against the winner of the Mt. San
Antonio-Cuyamaca College game.
"The offense
is finally seeing the light at the end of the
tunnel," said Falcon head coach
Ruben
Gonzalez, who led the team to the
school's first state championship last season. "We
had been playing like we were bored during the
season, but now that the playoffs have begun, we've
been talking about this being a new season. We've
talked about needing to win five games and now we
have three to go."
The pressure took
about 20 minutes to start, as both teams were
looking for their openings. The first chance for
Cerritos came in the 29th minute when sophomore
Corina Villegas (Perris HS)
was sent a ball to the front of the net and tired to
jump toward the goal to get the ball past Brahma
(18-4-3) goalkeeper Berry Ramirez. But defender
Emelie Steward was there to clear the ball away.
But the Falcons
would get on the board twice right before halftime
and ride that momentum for the rest of the game. In
the 41st minute, sophomore
Monique Cisneros (Mayfair
HS) sent a pass from midfield down the sideline
for freshman
Mayra
Garcia (Locke HS). Following
up the middle was Villegas, who received the pass
from Garcia and scored after chipping the ball past
Ramirez and Martinez, who was defending Villegas. It
was the third goal of the playoffs for Villegas, who
has also assisted on two others. Then, during extra
time, Villegas sent a pass in to Cisneros, who
dribbled to the far corner of the box and sent a
shot into the lower corner for her 36th goal of the
season.
"We tried to be
very direct offensively against Pierce," added
Gonzalez. "We brought Mayra down to create more
chances for Corina and Mo and she has done a great
job so far." The Falcons are using Garcia in a more
offensive role since losing freshman
Liliana Leos
(Southeast HS) for the season due to an
injury. Prior to getting hurt, Leos had scored 12
goals with 14 assists.
Shutting down the
LA Pierce offense was a solid group of defenders,
led by sophomores
Tara
Corcoran (Bonia HS/Cal State Long
Beach) and
Desiree
Cardenas (West Covina HS). The
two, along with sophomore
Betty
Cornejo (Bellflower HS) and
freshmen
Marleen
Alamilla (La Habra HS) and
Luliana
Maldonado (Paramount HS), held
the Brahmas in check and took the pressure off
goalkeepers
Chantal
Cervero (Cerritos HS) and
Tiffany Hollis (Lakewood HS),
who combined to record the team's single-season
record 16th shutout, including their fourth in a row
- all by 3-0 scores.
Closing out the
scoring in the second half was sophomore
Elba
Menjivar (Monroe HS/Pasadena City
College), who tried to send a ball toward the
goal, but had it deflected away. Continuing to work
hard, Menjivar retrieved the ball and lifted a shot
over Ramirez into the upper corner for a goal in the
63rd minute.
1st 2nd F
LA Pierce 0 0 0
Cerritos 2 1 3
Scoring:
LA Pierce: None
Cerritos: Corina
Villegas (41st minute; Mayra Garcia assist), Monique
Cisneros (45th minute; Corina Villegas assist), Elba
Menjivar (63rd minute; unassisted)
Shots on Goal:
LA Pierce: 4
Cerritos: 20
Keeper Saves:
LA Pierce: Betty
Ramirez - 13 saves
Cerritos: Chantal
Cervero - 2 saves (45 minutes); Tiffany Hollis - 0
saves (45 minutes)
Records:
LA Pierce - 18-4-3
(Seeded #9)
Cerritos - 19-0-4
(Seeded #1)
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