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Burbank girls’ soccer rallies to tie rival Burroughs

Burbank's Adrianne Sarukhanyan gets challenged hard by Burroughs' Daisy Casteneda for the ball in a Pacific League girls' soccer rivalry game at Burbank on Thursday.

Burbank’s Adrianne Sarukhanyan gets challenged hard by Burroughs’ Daisy Casteneda for the ball in a Pacific League girls’ soccer rivalry game at Burbank on Thursday.

(Tim Berger / Staff Photographer)
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There was plenty at stake Thursday for the Burbank High and Burroughs girls’ soccer teams besides cross-town rivalry supremacy.

The Bulldogs and Indians had another matter to settle on the field — wrapping up third place in the Pacific League. A tie or win would give Burbank the nod behind Arcadia and Crescenta Valley. A victory by Burroughs would catapult the Indians into the third spot.

Host Burbank got the result it needed, as Kira Bochard scored two goals late in the second half to help the Bulldogs earn a 2-2 tie.

Arcadia, Crescenta Valley, Burbank and Burroughs had already wrapped up playoff berths. With the Indians and Bulldogs tied for third, Burbank (10-4-3, 9-4-1 in league for 28 points) clinched the league’s third seed by going 1-0-1 in the two head-to-head match-ups with Burroughs (12-4-1, 9-4-1).

“It was a very exciting game, though we certainly didn’t make things easy,” said Burbank Coach Eric Montoya, whose team posted a 2-1 win against Burroughs at Memorial Field on Jan. 22. “Kira showed why she’s one of the top players in our league by scoring those two goals. We just needed a tie and we came back from a tough spot to do it.”

Burroughs held a 2-0 lead before Bochard and the Bulldogs mounted their comeback. Bochard chipped a shot past Burroughs goalkeeper Emma Bartram to cut the deficit to 2-1 with about 20 minutes remaining. She then tied it with four minutes to go.

Burbank nearly won it with a minute to play, but a shot by Pricilla Romero struck the crossbar.

“Time was running out on us, so we needed to make a big push,” Bochard said before leaving for a vacation to Florida. “It’s a huge rivalry game, but we really wanted to get third.

“It kind of feels like a win for us in being able to come back the way we did. We had to push through some things and we got a good result.”

Burroughs appeared to have control of the match. The Indians received a first-half goal from Jazmine Valdez in the 21st minute and took a 2-0 advantage on a goal by Maddy Sena in the 42nd minute.

Burroughs tried to pad the advantage, but couldn’t solve Burbank goalkeeper Nicole Winters the rest of the contest.

“We go out there and try to win every game, regardless of the ramifications,” Burroughs Coach Brady Riggs said. “We got a couple of goals and things were looking good and then Kira scores twice to tie it.

“That’s a great player who scored two goals. We’re still playing well right now. We are 9-1-1 in our last 11 games and we have some momentum going into the playoffs. We will continue to stay positive.”

Sena said the Indians played well throughout most of the match.

“I thought we did the best we could,” Sena said. “We felt good with the 2-0 lead. We’ll try to play even better in the playoffs.”

Burbank had a couple of good scoring opportunities in the first half. Bochard rolled a shot just wide of the left post in the fifth minute and Bartram deflected a 25-yard shot by Dalia Farazdaghi over the crossbar.

Bartram finished with seven saves. Winters had four saves.

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