Coaches Try to Avoid Running Up Scores
Irvine’s game with Pasadena Muir was only 40 minutes old and Irvine forward Matt Taylor already had five goals. Naturally, he was looking for more.
“He wanted the county record [of seven],” Vaquero Coach Rich Breza said. “He said, ‘I can get it, Coach.’ ”
Breza had no doubt he could.
“I’m pretty sure he could have gotten five more goals the way he was going,” Breza said. “He was beating people left and right. He hadn’t even missed a shot.”
But five goals was all Taylor got. Breza pulled him at halftime of the Vaqueros’ 8-0 victory last week in the South Torrance tournament.
“I just didn’t think it was right to leave him on the field and run it up,” said Breza.
Breza isn’t the only county coach who has grappled with that decision this season, which has been a goal-scorer’s delight and a goalkeeper’s nightmare.
In Huntington Beach’s 10-1 victory over La Quinta, Drew McAthy came within a goal of breaking the county record, which Garden Grove’s Albert Mendez set in 1995 against Magnolia. Estancia’s Esaul Mendoza already has two five-goal games and El Dorado’s Ignacio Cid has three hat tricks, even while missing five games with a concussion.
Cid, who led the county last year with 29 goals, has 22 in 14 games. He might have the county single-game record by now if not for his coach, Marc Smith.
“If we have a three-goal lead and Nacho has three goals, he’s done,” Smith said. “He knows where I stand on it, so I don’t get much argument.”
Cid is not the only El Dorado starter to miss a significant amount of playing time.
“I’d say four or five starters are averaging less than three-quarters of a game,” Smith said. “We’ve had at least 10 games that have been out of control by halftime.”
In winning last week’s Lompoc tournament, ninth-ranked El Dorado (16-3) outscored its opponents, 24-2.
“There’s just a big gap this year,” he said. “There’s a lot of good teams and there’s a lot of really bad ones.”
So even when Smith pulls his starters, his reserves are still scoring.
“You can’t tell some who don’t normally get a chance to play to stop scoring,” he said. “They like to get their names in the paper too. And these are kids we might be counting on later, so you want them to be able to remember how to score.”
The other factor Smith considers is injury. The more lopsided the game, the uglier it usually becomes.
“You get up 5-0 and the other team isn’t playing anymore,” he said. “They’ll just whack you. They’re frustrated and I don’t blame them for being frustrated.”
POLLS HAVE ARRIVED
The regular season is half over and the Southern Section has finally released its first poll.
According to the rankings, the road to a Division II title will be the bumpiest for county teams. Five of the county’s top nine teams in this week’s rankings are in Division II. Huntington Beach (10-0-1) is second in Division II behind Riverside Poly, Mater Dei (18-3-1) is fourth, El Dorado (16-3) is fifth, Edison (8-1-1) is sixth and Woodbridge, the defending section champion, is 10th.
In Division III, three-time defending champion Santa Margarita, the county’s top-ranked team, is No. 1. Brea Olinda is second, Foothill is fifth and Laguna Hills is eighth. In Division IV, Servite is No. 1 and Estancia is 10th.
The county’s highest-ranked Division I team is Esperanza, which is sixth. Santa Ana is seventh and Saddleback is ninth. In Division V, defending champion Orange Lutheran is third and St. Margaret’s is seventh.
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