St. Francis soccer falls to Newbury Park on last-second goal
LA CAÑADA — It’s possible the St. Francis High soccer team won’t suffer the kind of defeat it encountered Wednesday for the rest of the season.
It will, however, serve as a reminder and a lesson learned for the Golden Knights.
Stunned St. Francis yielded a match-winning goal to Newbury Park’s Nick Scherer with one second left in the contest en route to a 2-1 home defeat in a pool-play game of the Ralph Brandt Tournament at Friedman Field.
St. Francis (0-2) had the ball with less than 30 seconds to go, but was called for an illegal throw-in. Newbury Park (2-0) was awarded a throw-in following the infraction. The throw-in by Newbury Park’s Luke Varav went down the right sideline and was gathered by Jacob Locker, who passed the ball to Scherer. Scherer then beat St. Francis goalkeeper Luis Granados just before time expired.
“It’s a tough loss, but I liked the way we played the second half,” St. Francis coach Glen Appels said. “It’s an unfortunate call on the throw-in by us and then they come down and score just like that.
“We were trying to go for the win in those last few seconds and we had most of our guys up on the play.”
St. Francis, which finished fourth in the Mission League last season, tied the match at 1 on a goal by Ian Odermatt with about 12 minutes remaining.
A throw-in by Alex Jordan bounced inside the box before Odermatt headed the ball past Newbury Park goalkeeper Chris Hughes.
It was the first goal of the season for the Golden Knights, who began the tournament Monday with a 1-0 pool-play loss against Van Nuys.
“We kept pressing and we finally got that goal and we felt good about ourselves,” Appels said. “It’s just about trying to get better every game.”
Newbury Park, which won the Marmonte League championship last season, took a 1-0 lead in the 25th minute on a goal by Adam Mockridge.
The Panthers had a couple of quality scoring chances in the first half. A shot by Luke Mitchell bounced off the post in the second minute. Granados, who finished with eight saves, turned aside a low shot by Mitchell nearly five minutes later.
Hughes made five saves in the second half, including a diving stop on a shot by Maximus Weideman-Esacobedo about a minute into the second half.
Newbury Park coach Paul Sanford said he couldn’t remember seeing a match end the way it did Wednesday.
“I’m going to have trouble explaining it to people,” said Sanford, whose team blanked Van Nuys, 2-0, in a pool-play contest Tuesday. “It was quick thinking from Luke on that throw-in and then you get that great pass to the middle by Jake to Nick and we get the goal.
“It was just a fun game.”
Twitter: @TCNCharlesRich
