Santa Barbara boys soccer couldn’t get into the win column at the Mater Dei Showcase on Friday, dropping matchups to Foothill and Mater Dei.
Foothill 3, Santa Barbara 2
The Dons dropped their first matchup of the showcase to Foothill.
After falling behind early, Santa Barbara found a groove and made a late comeback effort in the second half. However, they couldn’t make up the deficit and fell by one goal.
Ben Hashim and Thiago Valerio found the back of the net for the team’s two goals.
“In the first game, we made two early mistakes and Foothill did a good job defensively against us,” Dons coach Ricardo Alcaraz said. “We came out a bit flat to start the game but overall I thought we played good football once we got going.”
Mater Dei 4, Santa Barbara 1
The Dons struggled to contain Division I powerhouse Mater Dei in their second and final match of the showcase.
Mater Dei came out hot by scoring three goals in the first 20 minutes, capitalizing on a pair of mistakes and slotting in a penalty kick.
“Against teams like Foothill and Mater Dei, we must limit our mistakes because these teams will take advantage of it, which they did,” Alcaraz said.
Santa Barbara then settled in and limited the strong Mater Dei offense the rest of the way thanks to solid midfield play by Walker Jensen, Josue Ventura, Eli Myers and Luis Barron.
“We knew they were going to go long every time to their center forward and our centerbacks did very well,” Alcaraz said.
The lone Dons goal came early in the second half when Valerio received the ball in the box, beat a defender and snuck his shot past the goalkeeper to cut the lead to 3-1.
Mater Dei scored one more goal before the final whistle.
“Our kids played very well against a very good Mater Dei team,” Alcaraz said. “I’m proud of the character they showed in the game. They played soccer the right way. Although we didn’t get the results we wanted, we gained a lot of experience that will hopefully help us in the long run.”
Santa Barbara will take on Thousand Oaks on the road on Thursday.
