Cate battled back from a one-goal deficit against a fired-up Dunn squad in the second half and earned a 3-3 draw on Wednesday in a Condor League boys soccer match.
Geoffrey Acheampong scored two goals for the Rams, including a game-tying penalty kick in the 65th minute.
Abu DanladI, who earlier in the day signed a National Letter of Intent with UCLA, scored twice for Dunn.
Cate was sloppy early in the match but still managed to take a 1-0 lead in the 17th minute when Acheampong knocked a loose ball in the box into the goal.
Dunn countered three minutes later to knot the game at 1-1.
Cate pressured Dunn’s back line early in the second half and broke through in the 54th minute for a go-ahead goal. Abraham Tall curled a free kick into the penalty box, where Acheampong headed it across the goal to Matthew Firestone for the finish.
But Dunn struck back just four minutes later when Danladi ran free onto a cross and scored to tie the score at 2-2.
Dunn kept the momentum and took a 3-2 lead on a rocket from about 35 yards out.
Cate (7-2-4 overall and 3-0-1 in Condor League) stepped up its play and put together several attacks. On one of those attacks, Joel Serugo got dragged down in the box from behind.
.Acheampong converted the penalty kick to tie the score at 3-3.
Cate coach Peter Mack admitted his team wasn’t sharp against Dunn.
“We didn’t defend with the kind of coordinated full-field pressure we normally do, and against a team like Dunn’s, which has some high caliber players, there’s a good chance you’ll pay a price for such sloppiness,” he said. “On the plus side, we didn’t panic when we went down 3-2. We simply went back to work, which is a very positive statement about our resiliency and determination. This was a good learning opportunity for us.”
