Playing a man down for more than an hour, the Santa Barbara High boys soccer team turned in a solid performance and beat crosstown rival Dos Pueblos, 2-1, in a Channel League match Thursday at La Playa Stadium.
With a full lineup, the Dons bolted out to a 2-0 lead on goals by Edgar Ruiz and Alfredo Ibarra after the first 12 minutes. They then sat back and staunchly defended their goal for the last 60 minutes after centerback Tony Alfaro was shown a red card for a studs-up tackle on a 50-50 ball.
It was huge gut-check for the defending CIF champions against the team that is its main threat for the league title.
“I’m really proud of the boys,” Santa Barbara coach Todd Heil said. “That 2-0 lead we got was really important for us. It sent a message.”
Edgar Ruiz of Santa Barbara and Irving Beltran of Dos Pueblos battle for control of the ball. Ruiz scored Santa Barbara's first goal. (Vince Agapito photo)
With the win, the Dons extended their unbeaten streak to 15 matches and improved to 13-3-3 overall and 3-0 in Channel League.
For Dos Pueblos (12-3-1, 0-1), it was a frustrating night. The Chargers outshot the Dons 14-3 but capitalized only once with the man advantage.
“It’s a disappointing result for us,” said DP coach Tovi Eliasen, who has yet to beat Santa Barbara in five meetings over the last two years, including last year’s CIF Division 2 final. “We thought at least we could have gotten the equalizer. At halftime, I really expected we’d come back and win the game.”
The Chargers would have to do it playing against a packed-in Santa Barbara defense. They managed to cut the deficit to one when Chris Castillo got on the end of Jonathan Fisher’s 40-yard free kick and headed it in despite a challenge from goalkeeper Miguel Solis.
The goal came in the 20th minute, one minute after Alfaro’s ejection.
But that would be it for the Chargers, as they had trouble adjusting to Santa Barbara’s defensive alignment and struggled to generate many quality scoring chances.
“Any time you have to go through 10 men behind the ball it’s difficult,” Eliasen said. (Santa Barbara) did a good job of sending the balls away we sent in there. They did their job, and it’s a tough circumstance to be in. They did enough to win, I guess.”
Asked how the red card changed the game, Eliasen said, “It makes the game so weird, it makes the game unorthodox. We’re just not used to dumping balls in the box like that. As they dropped numbers back, it certainly makes it different. We still should have been able to score. Their goalkeeper made a couple of good saves.”
Solis had eight saves in the match. His best was a diving stop of a side-volley by Kyle Schmechel in the 70th minute.
Chris Castillo gets his head on the ball to score for Dos Pueblos in the 20th minute. (Vince Agapito photo).
“I don’t think we took enough risks,” Eliasen said. “I thought we should have unleashed a few longer shots and jumped on rebounds a little bit better. There were things we could have done a little bit more, which is disappointing.”
Heil felt it was necessary to take the defensive posture because of the risk of getting burned on a large field.
“As soon as the red card happened, we just decided it’s too big of a field and if we’re going to spread ourselves out and play normal, we’re going to be trouble,” he said. “So, the best thing we could do was essentially bunker in and make them pass the ball sideways and laterally as much as they possibly can. We essentially wanted to force them to cross the ball. And we didn’t want to give up shots.”
The Dons got stellar performances from Tyler Schleich, who filled in for Alfaro, and Spencer Prichard on the back line. They anchored the center of the defense and kept the team organized.
“When Tony went out, everybody basically stepped up their game,” said Schleich. “We just worked even harder when Tony went out.”
“He came in and did a great job,” said Heil of Schleich, who normally plays in the central midfield. “It’s good to have players like that, that can play multiple roles.”
After playing DP to a scoreless draw in regulation last week in the final of the Buena New Year’s tournament (Santa Barbara won on PKs), the Dons stunned the Chargers with a goal in the fourth minute Thursday. Alfaro hit a beautiful ball to a streaking Ruiz up the middle of the field and Ruiz beat DP goalkeeper Eric Katz one on one.
Santa Barbara attacked from the right flank for its second goal. Defender Cooper Allebrand crossed the ball to the center of the box and a wide-open Ibarra scored on a diving header.
The two-goal lead gave the Dons enough of a cushion to hold off DP.
Even with 10 men.
It’s a shame that such negative soccer prevailed.