Santa Barbara High and San Marcos met in the the fifth-place semifinals at the South Torrance Holiday Classic boys soccer tournament on Wednesday, and the Dons scored a 2-1 victory.
Sloan Hanson and Owen Lambe scored for Santa Barbara. Owen Bates tallied the San Marcos goal off a Tony Garcia assist.
This match-up was set up after both teams lost in the quarterfinals.
Santa Barbara was beaten by Marquez, 3-2, while San Marcos was routed by Palos Verdes, 5-0.
“We didn’t have a response to what they were doing and weren’t able to avoid their attacks,” San Marcos coach Daniel Torres said of the loss. “We did a better job against Santa Barbara, but they still created more chances than us, and at the end of the day you have to create chances in order to score.”
Santa Barbara got off to a rocky start against Marquez, trailing 2-0 after 27 minutes. But the Dons recovered and got the two goals back within five minutes to tie the score before halftime. Brandon Garcia and Juan Carlos Torres scored.
The Dons played well in the second half but couldn’t come up with the go-ahead. They then got a bad break when the official awarded Marquez a penalty kick with five minutes left in the regulation. Marquez converted for the deciding goal.
The Dons play Fremont at noon Thursday in the fifth-place game.
— Noozhawk sports editor Barry Punzal can be reached at bpunzal@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk Sports on Twitter: @NoozhawkSports. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.