Los Alamitos Dethrones Marina

With a flurry of goals in the first half, the Los Alamitos girls’ soccer team dethroned three-time defending Sunset League champion Marina with a 4-1 victory Thursday at Marina.

Andrea Sievers scored two goals to lead the Griffins to their first Sunset League championship. Los Alamitos won Empire League titles in 1993 and 1994 and placed second in the Sunset League last season behind Marina.

Los Alamitos, 13-5-4 and 7-3-0 in league, used last season’s 6-0 league loss to Marina as motivation Thursday.

“It was payback time,” Sievers said. “We knew that we had to win to win league and we knew that they were going to come out hard.”

Marina (12-8-4, 4-4-2), which won the last three Southern Section Division I championships, finished fourth in league and will not make the playoffs.

Los Alamitos used two corner kicks to take a 2-0 lead 30 minutes into the game. Carrie Shinen scored after the first in the 21st minute and Sievers scored after the second in the 30th minute.

Three minutes later, Noelle Rennard sent a long pass through the Marina defense and Sommer Hammoud scored to give Los Alamitos a 3-0 halftime lead.

Sievers scored again in the 65th minute on a high shot that Marina goalkeeper Sarah Wahl couldn’t push over the top of the goal.

Los Alamitos was 1-2 in its first three league games and lost star midfielder Ali Ponce, who quit in the early season. Coach Rich Manning wondered if his team would meet the challenge.

“I knew that there was talent there and I knew there were good players,” he said. “I was wondering whether that was going to come through.”