A last-minute goal by Sofia Faraoni capped off a flurry of stoppage time action and gave San Marcos girls soccer the 2-1 victory over rival Santa Barbara High on Wednesday at Warkentin Stadium.
Faraoni’s game-winning goal was just two minutes after the equalizer by the Dons (1-7-3, 0-6-2 Channel League), and will give the Royals (3-7-2, 2-4-2 CL) plenty of much-needed momentum as they continue the second half of Channel League play.
“One of the things we’ve been preaching the last couple of weeks is just the mentality of being able to close out games,” San Marcos head coach Miguel Vences said. “It’s been a tough season for us, where we’ve had great games and haven’t been able to close them out.
“It was a roller coaster of emotions, but they definitely responded… Getting that win, especially against a rival, gives them that confidence to carry into the next game.”
A goal early in the second half gave the Royals a 1-0 lead, and they dominated the time of possession and seemed on their way to a crosstown win heading into stoppage time.
However, the Dons continued to fight and earned a corner kick in stoppage time.
Madeleine Savellano lofted the ball into the box, where a scramble ensued until the ball found Ginger Winkler, who snuck her shot into the back of the net for the game-tying score to make it 1-1.
“We’ve been building towards getting all of our best players on the field at once,” Santa Barbara High assistant coach Marco Medina said. “We’re finally healthy. We’ve been working on a lot of things at training, and today, it showed.
“We were combining in the midfield. We got our chances, and we kept grinding for that goal near the end of the game. I thought we had that tie, but we’re proud of the girls. We kept fighting and we didn’t give up.”
Two minutes later, San Marcos pushed the ball into the attacking third and Cami Sparks lofted a ball into the box. The ball ricocheted off a defender right to Faraoni, who drilled a shot into the back of the net for the game-winner.
“I think when [SB] tied it when there were like three minutes left, I feel like for a second there (we) started to say ‘Not again,’” Vences said. “I feel like because we’ve been preaching the never die attitude, you definitely saw that play out.”
The Royals had several chances to score the opening goal of the game in the first 10 minutes, as Kate Selby narrowly missed a shot that hit off the left crossbar and Dons’ goalkeeper Alice Sweeney came up with a point-blank save to keep it scoreless.
The next 10 minutes were relatively quiet, as neither side could maintain possession for long spurts of time and most of the action came near midfield.
San Marcos had a pair of golden opportunities to score once again with back-to-back corner kicks in the 28th minute, but Sweeney stopped another close shot and the Dons cleared the ball both times to maintain the 0-0 score.
“Alice has been amazing all year long,” Medina said. “She’s kept us in the games. She takes the blame, but she shouldn’t take the blame because she’s been keeping it together for our team. She’s an amazing keeper.”
That score held for the rest of the first half, as both back lines stood tall and turned away any scoring chances.
“One of our biggest strengths is our back line. I think they did a really good job in communicating and just reading the game,” Vences said.
“They’ve played together for club and high school for such a long time that they have this synergy that you can just see play out, the way they play and communicate, and just don’t give the team too many chances.”
The Royals came out of the break on the offensive, and it paid off almost immediately with a goal.
In the second minute of the second half, Zeina Matni found herself with the ball on the right sideline. She dribbled past a pair of defenders into the box, where she slipped a pass off to Kate Selby.
Selby then calmly deposited a shot into the bottom right corner of the goal to give her team the first lead of the night at 1-0.
“I think the most important thing is just that belief, like ‘Hey, we got one early, let’s go get that second one,’” Vences said of scoring first. “They were just continuing the rhythm and having possession of the ball and just continuing to dominate in all aspects of the game.
“That belief is so important, especially when you’re going through a season where goals are hard to come by.”
The Royals dominated the time of possession in the second half, consistently applying pressure and firing off shots at the goal. However, none of those shots got past Sweeney as the lead remained at 1-0 heading into the stoppage time heroics.
“We just told the girls, ‘Don’t wait to play like that just because it’s a rivalry game. Play like that in every game, moving forward because we can compete with any team in the league,’” Medina said.
San Marcos will look to carry this momentum into a road matchup with Oxnard on Friday. Meanwhile, the Dons will head across town to take on Dos Pueblos on Friday at 5:15 p.m.