Visiting El Cerrito scored two unanswered goals in the final 48 minutes and held on to beat the St. Patrick-St. Vincent High girls soccer team, 2-1, in Tuesday’s Tri-County Athletic League opener for both teams.
It was a disappointing defeat for the Lady Bruins (1-2, 0-1 TCAL), who had an early lead but couldn’t hold on.
“When we get that advantage, we have to play smarter,” said SPSV head coach Javier Martinez. “We can’t afford to beat ourselves. We’re not the quickest team in the league so we have to play smarter than the other team. This game was very winnable for us but we just lacked that mental toughness.”
“I felt we did really well the first half, but we just let up in the second,” said junior midfielder Chloe Lindemann, who had the only goal for SPSV. “We didn’t play up to our potential in the second half. We weren’t in there mentally.”
The Lady Bruins got off to a solid start, controlling the ball while putting pressure on El Cerrito’s defense. SPSV broke the scoreless tie 20 minutes into the opening half when an El Cerrito defender inadvertently passed the ball to Lindemann, who blasted in her first goal of the season to make it 1-0.
“It just came straight to me and I just shot it in,” Lindemann said.
That lead lasted until the 32nd minute when El Cerrito’s Jenna Van Pelt made a perfect through pass to teammate Helen Gilbert-Snyder, who threaded two SPSV defenders and went straight up the middle for a breakaway goal.
The Lady Gauchos (2-2-1, 1-0 TCAL) took the lead for good 15 minutes into the second half. An SPSV defender fell down near the Lady Bruins net and Gilbert-Synder pounced, sending a crossing pass to a wide-open Madeline MacCoun for the go-ahead goal.
“If we don’t make those two mental mistakes, we win this game,” Martinez said.
SPSV had its chances to tie things up. Elliana Levin had a wicked shot sail just wide left, Emily Thompson almost beat El Cerrito goalkeeper Miya Keilin to a loose ball and freshman Skylar Jacobs made several nice offensive plays. SPSV goalkeeper Cydney Hampton was flawless over the final 25 minutes, but that tying goal never came.
“Cydney played well and we were keeping possession of the ball real well for a while, and then we went away from that and just wanted to kick and run,” Martinez said. “Every game is gonna be like this. It’s going to be a dogfight and it’s going to be physical. One mistake here or there will determine the outcome of the game. If we don’t play like we’re capable of playing, then the score can get out of hand.”
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