When Push Comes to Shove, Splash Wins

The last time Splash fans saw Bernie Lilavois, he was picking a shoving match with a a player four inches taller and 30 pounds heavier.

Lilavois wound up on his rear somewhere near San Clemente in the final seconds of an embarrassing loss, but at least he showed some pride--and a little fight.

A little of that spirit carried over to Friday’s 11-6 victory over Detroit, as the Splash got four goals and an assist from Lilavois.

The Splash (12-12) won for only the third time in 10 games and inched closer to clinching a Continental Indoor Soccer League playoff berths--one more victory, or a Portland loss, will do it.

The Splash is 12-12, in third place in the Western Division, two games behind San Diego and a half-game behind Sacramento.

The Neon dropped to 11-12 in the East.

The victory came in front of 8,413 at the Pond, its largest crowd of the season.

It was put up or shut up time for the Splash, who played the fourth quarter with the kind of intensity it showed earlier this year, when it had a chance to get away from the rest of the division.

This was the first time in five games since Aug. 12 that the Splash went into the fourth quarter tied or ahead and scored consecutive goals.

Up to Aug. 12, it was 7-0 under such circumstances, and 8-3 overall when scoring consecutive fourth-quarter goals. The Splash was 9-5 at the time.

Since then, it had been as though the Splash had forgotten how to win, or lost any killer instinct it might have had.

“Tonight we went for the jugular,” said Danny Barber, who had three assists.

“We didn’t play as well as we could play, but for once, we scored the goals when we needed to score.”

After Lilavois’ power-play goal gave the Splash a 6-5 lead with 16 seconds left in the third, Dale Ervine (three goals, one assist) and Mike Lynch scored in the fourth to make it 8-5.

“Dale and I talked right after my goal and said that the next goal was going to get us over the hump,” Lilavois said.

Though Andy Chapman scored with a sixth attacker for Detroit, the Splash answered with empty-net goals by Sam George (two goals), Ervine and Lilavois.

“We talked about this before the game, that we wanted to play for pride, with passion, with emotion for once,” said Lilavois, maybe the Splash’s most fiery player.

“We knew there would be a big crowd and we wanted to leave [our effort] on the field.

“When you’re used to winning, it’s easy to have composure. We’ve been used to giving away games lately.”

Ervine reached another milestone in his career.

Eight seconds after Doug Neely tied the score at 1-1, Ervine tied Rudy Pikuzinski as the all-time leading American goal-scorer.

Ervine’s goal, taken from 35 feet, was redirected by a defender and it dribbled past goalkeeper Jaro. Ervine’s first goal in the fourth quarter surpassed Pikuzinski.

The Splash trailed at halftime, 4-3, but was tied at 5-5 when Lilavois scored a power-play goal in the final seconds of the third quarter.

It was the only power-play opportunity for the Splash, which had the league’s power-play unit.