Dos Pueblos' Kyle Schmechel, left, scored the Chargers' winning goal. (Tom Modugno Photo)
It wasn’t for the league championship, but Tuesday’s rare win over Santa Barbara sure felt like it for the Dos Pueblos boys soccer team.
The Chargers celebrated the end of a long winless streak against the Dons by making Kyle Schmechel’s goal in the 45th minute stand up for 1-0 victory at Scott O’Leary Stadium.
The Dos Pueblos players mobbed each other and shouted with gusto after the final whistle blew in the Channel League battle. They’re not in the running for the league title, but the confidence-boosting victory put Santa Barbara’s chances of repeating as champion in jeopardy.
The Dons fell to 5-2 (15 points) in league and 15-5-3 overall. They must beat league-leader Ventura (5-0-1, 16 points) on Thursday and then hope Ventura loses or ties its finale against Buena next Tuesday.
Dos Pueblos (15-5-2) stands in third place at 3-3.
Schmechel’s goal was a deserving reward for his stellar performance. The senior central midfielder was making plays all over the field.
“In my opinion, he’s an MVP-type of guy in this league,” DP coach Tovi Eliasen said of Schmechel. “He’s the heart and soul of our team on most nights. He does so much work defensively and offensively, and I’m happy to see him get that glory tonight. It’s great.”
The goal-scoring play started with a throw into the box that was knocked back by Irving Beltran. Schmechel ran up on a bouncing loose ball and smashed a 20-yard volley past goalkeeper Miguel Solis.
“Whenever I score I can’t believe it happened,” said an overjoyed Schmechel. “These are our biggest rivals. This is the first time in four years we’ve beaten them. It’s a good way to do it.”
The Chargers now had to hold off the hard-charging Dons for the remaining 35 minutes.
Santa Barbara, which beat DP for the CIF title last year and won two meetings — a shootout in the Buena Tournament final, and 2-1 decision in the first regular season contest — this season, created some good scoring chances in the second half. T.J. Fairchild hit an open header over the cross bar, Alberto Hernandez had a clear shot go wide and Sanford Spivey misfired on a couple of looks.
“It’s a tough place for us to score, that’s for certain,” said Santa Barbara coach Todd Heil, whose CIF championship team was held to a scoreless draw last year at DP. “We had three or four good looks in the second half and nothing to come from it. They get the one good look and he hits it. And he hit a rocket. It was good shot, but I wish we had one of those shots back.”
In their first meeting, played at City College, the Dons scored two goals in the first 25 minutes to take the starch out of DP.
This time the Chargers changed their alignment to strengthen their defense.
“We changed our formation to a 4-4-2 to be more defensive and our whole team came together. It was our last game (as seniors) against SB and we wanted to make it the best we could,” said Schmechel, who, along with Johnny Fisher, broke up several Santa Barbara attacks in the middle of the field.
“We all did wonderful,” said DP senior centerback Chris Castillo. “Having a shutout against Santa Barbara is great.”
Great Job DP finally u. Beating