Kevin Colindres--Corsair Staff Writer
October 13, 2016
In soccer, there is no greater tension than a tied game with 90 minutes and stoppage on the clock. Any shot can be the game winner and for the Corsairs, that magic shot found the back of the net to walk off the pitch with a 2-1 victory over LA Pierce College.
The game started off at the bottom of a passionless pit. Many of the Corsair players seemed aloof, and made bad judgement calls that led to many turnovers followed with shoddy passes.
This all turned around when mid-fielder Kirstin Ortega took over the field.
"I could tell the team wasn't fully in the game, I needed to build up confidence and help my teammates play together," Ortega said.
Ortega began yelling across the field, communicating to the other players in order to organize the team. Things were clicking and the team moved together a lot better. Three minutes into the game and the first goal, shot by Ortega, landed. The Corsairs had a 1-0 lead.
This definitely brought the momentum to full speed, making the team look refreshed and put together.
"At this point, we were feeling a lot more confident and I could see the girls looked completely different from the start of the game," Ortega said.
Even with this new found confidence, the game itself grew stagnant. Neither team made any game defining moves. At this point, the Corsairs grew comfortable and LA Pierce made it a mission to catch up. Pierce switched to an aggressive strategy while the Corsairs began to fumble. Things took a turn for the worse when LA Pierce's Leslie Ramirez was able to weave through the Corsair defense and score a clean goal, making the score 1-1.
"Once they scored on us the team seemed to be more alert," midfielder Marissa Moore said. "We wanted to win this game so we had to lockdown on defense and take smart shots."
The Corsairs, now rattled at the possibility of a loss pumped up their defense. They denied LA Pierce from even getting near the goal. Nothing was getting done in the second half, the players knew something had to change. With 20 minutes left it was clear to see that the Corsairs were playing as hard as they could, keeping the game near the opponents goal at all times. Even with multiple goal attempts, none of them were landing. The frustration of the players grew to a boiling point with just 5 minutes left in the game.
"I could see that we were losing hope but I had to continue to motivate my team," Moore said.
Moore spoke fiercely to her teammates in a last minute attempt to inspire and encourage them. The time was running out but they finally pulled it together. The ball found its way to Beverly Bourdet and she scored the game-winning goal with absolutely no time left on the clock. The Corsairs won their sixth game of the year, improving their record to 6-7-1.
"We have a lot to work on but it was a good win for us and it will help us grow into a better team as the year finishes," Coach Benditson said.
The Corsairs play at West LA Friday October 14.