The U18B Black team traveled to Pleasanton this past weekend to represent the Club at the Ballistic United Summer Classic. In a flight of 12 teams that included several top 10 and top 20 ranked sides, the boys fought hard and ended up taking 3rd place. The weekend didn’t start out as desired with a 3-1 loss to a good Merced Atlas team which was very strong on set pieces. Knowing that their work was cut out for them after losing the opening match, the boys rallied, winning 6-0 Saturday afternoon against a team from Oakley to keep their weekend hopeful.
Needing another win against Milpitas Sunday morning to advance, the team showed up strong and played great soccer, but for 59 minutes and 30 seconds, couldn’t get a goal across the line. That changed in the final 30 seconds as midfielder Lantz Shope won a ball at midfield, and spotting winger Brendan Allen making a run and drawing most of the Milpitas defense, he slotted a great pass to striker Pablos Carlos in the box who beat one defender and then the keeper to score literally as the referee looked at his watch and prepared to blow the final whistle. With the 1-0 thrilling win, the team advanced to the 3rd place match.
After giving up an early goal against Manteca in the playoff match, the team got their composure back in a physical, hard fought battle, equalizing late in the first half on a stunning goal from Connor Entz who would not be denied. The second half remained knotted at 1-1, and after some…interesting…officiating, the Placer team found itself playing down two men and the Manteca team down a man, for a net one man advantage to Manteca. The boys in yellow stayed strong however, surviving the final 5 minutes of regulation and 10 minutes of overtime without conceding. With kicks from the mark now the determining factor, the Placer lads were down 3-2 after 3 rounds. Another miss from Placer left the team hanging by a thread, with any further miss or Manteca conversion would end it. But Manteca forgot to factor in Alex “The Wall” Vazquez.
SAVE! – the Placer Goalkeeper made a huge diving save right to keep it at 3-2. After captain Brendan Allen scored to equalize at 3-3, Vazquez SAVED again with a perfect dive to his left! As the sequence moved to sudden-death kicks, Shope converted for Placer to give the squad the lead at 4-3…and then Vazquez came up big again with a huge kick SAVE to ice it and give the team a thrilling win!
Coach Cory Clonce expressed great pride in the team coming back from an opening loss to reel off three straight wins and get a great result for the weekend. Go Placer!
