By Marion Wood
Staff Writer
The scoreboard didn’t reflect the performance by the girls’ soccer team last Friday night against La Canada High School. The Tigers lost 2-0 to the highly ranked Spartans, falling to an overall record of 4-4.
“We played well we just needed more ball control,” senior Julia Primuth said. “We worked really hard though so we’re not too sad about the loss. It was a good game.”
The teams started off a little shaky, with few goal opportunities for either side. The half ended at 0-0.
In the second half, the South Pas head coach decided to alter the defense formation. Instead of four defenders, the Tigers were now playing with three. Although this helped on offense, it left the defenders much more vulnerable in the back.
Around the 20-minute mark, the La Canada offense took advantage of the change. A Spartan midfielder dribbled it up the sidelines and crossed to a center forward, who sent the ball to the back of the net. They continued this strategy a few minutes later and scored again, bringing the game to 2-0.
The Tigers tried to retaliate with several attempted goals. They had one particularly close attempt with a free kick outside the box. Senior captain Jackie Mejia sent a high kick to the corner of the goal, but it barely went over the crossbar. The Tiger offense also had some close corner kicks and diagonal crosses, but repeatedly made mistakes on shooting.
“We had a good effort but we really couldn’t finish,” sophomore Megan Wong said. “We had a lot of opportunities to score that we never put away.”
The team was disappointed with the loss, but is optimistic about the rest of the season.
“I think we were a little sloppy and had a lot of chances that we should have put away, but we’ll bounce back for our next game against Temple City,” junior Olivia Chu said.
The Tigers play Temple City at home on Wednesday, January 21, at 3:30 PM.
