BENICIA HIGH’S Katie Lovelace (8) and Sara Hingley (23) battle Ceres captain Angelica Slater (15) and defender Karina Torrez (14) for a loose ball at Drolette Stadium.

Sara Hingley’s goal with just over five minutes remaining in a second overtime lifted Benicia High’s girls soccer team to a 2-1 victory over visiting Ceres in Tuesday’s opening round of the Sac-Joaquin Section Division III playoffs.

The Lady Panthers (12-6-2), seeded eighth in the 16-team tournament, put on enormous pressure in front of the Ceres net and screened Lady Bulldogs goalkeeper Yurixia Avalos. The ball caromed off Katie Lovelace right to Singley, who used her stomach to nudge the ball just over the goal line.

“It bounced off Katie and I just kinda pushed it in,” Singley said. “It all happened really fast.”

Lovelace severely injured her right ankle on the play and ninth-seeded Ceres nearly tied it less than two minutes later when Jade Dellafosse got loose on a breakaway. But her left-footed shot had nothing on it and was easily saved by Benicia goalkeeper Madison Goodmiller.

Goodmiller made several nice saves at the end of regulation, turning away a bending corner kick by Dominique Koeum and leaping to keep another shot from bouncing over her head into the net.

“I was impressed with her ability to hold on to the ball and not give up any rebounds,” said Benicia head coach Javier Martinez. “She was big tonight.”

The game was scoreless until the 53rd minute when Benicia’s Tatiana Soglin lifted a shot from 30 yards out that got caught in the wind and sailed over Avalos’s head to make it 1-0. It was only the 12th goal Ceres had allowed all year.

“I was trying to just get it down there and was kinda surprised it went in,” Soglin said.

But Ceres (10-4-2) battled back as Dellafosse snuck through the middle of Benicia’s defense for a breakaway goal with just over 11 minutes left. Benicia was without usual starting middle defender Kaela Thyrion, who missed the game due to an illness.

“That’s when we knew we really had to give it our all and leave it all on the field,” Soglin said.

The win sends the Lady Panthers to the Sac-Joaquin Section quarterfinals. As a reward, Benicia gets to travel to Manteca on Thursday to face undefeated No. 1 seed East Union.

“We just have to push hard and play our game,” Hingley said.

Benicia’s conference rivals – Vallejo and Vanden – each suffered shutout losses in the first round and were eliminated.

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