For 75 minutes, the Pasadena City College men's soccer team was having fun, creating numerous skilled scoring plays, and enjoying a 4-0 lead. But any game can turn on a dime and the Lancers needed every bit of the lofty advantage to withstand a late Imperial Valley College rally, winning 4-3. The non-conference game was played at Robinson Stadium.
Up 4-0, PCC head coach Gerry Mora was substituting many of his second-string players but also because of the intense heat conditions. Used to hot days in the Imperial Valley desert, a short-rostered IVC squad (13 players), found a boost of energy. Elias Lara twice received nifty passes to score goals inside the goalie box, once in the 78th minute, then again with four minutes left.
PCC responded but IVC goalie Jose Bernal made two spectacular saves to foil scoring chances by Roger Faustino, then Martin Manzanilla, who scored two goals overall but nearly had two or three more. Moments later, PCC's defense got sloppy and it resulted in Alejandro Serrano netting Imperial Valley's third goal in the 90th minute.
The Lancers just missed on a late shot by Nathan Cruz that went wide of the upper left corner, but maybe the clock was PCC's best friend as time then expired. Pasadena improved to 3-5 while Imperial Valley dropped to 1-6.
"It was a good win today with this crazy heat," Mora said. "We tried a new formation and we had Marcello Leyva make his college debut today. Our freshmen stepped up. Seth Sandoval played well at multiple positions. Manzanilla as a sophomore shows a great work ethic and has a non-stop mentality that resulted in our first goal. Clearly, we have to put in more work defensively because we are letting in too many goals."
In the game's fourth minute, Danny Vargas sent a lead pass to left side that Manzanilla made a sensational flick lift shot that he spun on a bounce into the far right corner of the net. An even more dazzling play took place in the 23rd minute when Andy Garcia received a pass and in one motion, with his back to the net, took a backward strike of the ball off his heel. Bernal stopped the tricky quick liner from 5 yards away.
In the 41st minute, Cruz dribbled the ball into the center of the field and ripped a lefty-foot blast into the upper center of the net for a 2-0 lead. Just three minutes later, Ronaldo Chavez led Manzanilla who fired in a short-range shot that gave PCC a commanding 3-0 lead at halftime.
In the 65th minute, Asher Smith rushed the ball deep into the goalie box then put a cross to a sliding Emilio Ramirez whose forward momentum punched in the goal.
Manzanilla was stoned by Bernal on a point blank shot off a pass by Sandoval just a minute into the second half, then took off on a breakaway only to have Bernal make an acrobatic save on a hard running shot deep in the box in the 69th minute. Bernal finished with 12 saves as PCC badly outshot Imperial Valley, 26-12.
Mora was pleased with the efforts made by Cruz, Ramirez and Sandoval on offense. While there was the late defensive breakdown, for much of the game Elias Galaviz and Erik Perez kept Imperial Valley from mounting much of an offense--just two first-half shots, none on goal.
The Lancers were coming off two solid defensive road efforts but each resulting in close losses. On Sept. 14, state #13-ranked Antelope Valley scored in the 12th minute and made it stand up in defeating visiting PCC, 1-0. Then on Sept. 17, Galaviz scored just a few minutes into the game, but host Canyons tied it four minutes shy of halftime and then scored the game-winner by Josh Swanson in extra time in a tough 2-1 Lancers loss.
Pasadena will play at Cuyamaca College on Friday, Sept. 24 in a 4 p.m. non-conference game.