The Preps : Soccer Roundup : Esperanza Clinches Title With Victory

The Esperanza High School girls’ soccer team clinched its second consecutive Empire League championship and moved closer to a possible No. 1 ranking among Southern Section 4-A schools Thursday with a 2-1 victory at Los Alamitos.

Esperanza (20-0-2, 8-0), which has 16 shutouts and has outscored opponents, 78-6, this season, got a goal and an assist from sophomore Lynn Murray in the first half and then held off Los Alamitos’ comeback.

The loss dropped Los Alamitos (13-6-2, 4-3-1) into third place, a game behind second-place El Dorado with two games to play. The Griffins, who have lost only twice at home in the last 2 seasons, close out the regular season next week against Cypress and El Dorado.

Esperanza, which was ranked second in the 4-A going into this week’s action, got its opportunity to play for the top spot when Capistrano Valley defeated No. 1 Mission Viejo lost Tuesday in a South Coast League match.

“As young as we are, it’s a shock,” said John Coppage, Esperanza coach, whose team has 13 juniors, 4 sophomores and 1 freshman. “Our kids didn’t expect too much of themselves going into this season, but they have really come through and jelled as a team. And Lynn Murray always seems to come up with the big goals when we have needed them.”

Los Alamitos Coach Larry Lopez said: “Esperanza deserves to be No. 1, and I intend to vote for them. We had our chances in the second half, but we have nothing to be ashamed of.”

Esperanza took a 1-0 lead with 15 minutes gone in the first half when Leigh Ann Murphy took a long pass from Murray and squirted a short, soft shot past goalie Becky Thompson.

Sixteen minutes later, Los Alamitos tied the score when Julie Harris’ sinking line-drive kick squirted off the hands of Aztec goalie Tymerie Busser into the net.

With 6 seconds left in the first half, Esperanza took a 2-1 lead. After Thompson made a diving save, Murray took the ball deep in the Los Alamitos penalty area and lobbed the ball past Thompson. The goal was Murray’s 20th of the season.

“That goal was a killer,” Lopez said. “If we didn’t allow that goal, we would have been tied, 1-1, at halftime and we would have maintained the momentum we gained after we tied the game up.”