Late goal pushes Stanhope-Elmore past Wildcats

A goal with 2:15 to play sent Stanhope-Elmore to a 3-2 victory March 18 against the Enterprise boys soccer team.

"I think the physicality of the game, combined with the fact it was just two days after a big win over McGill-Toolen, I'm not sure mentally we were ever really here today," EHS boys soccer coach Bruce Ladner said. "The physical nature of the game and scoring two goals I'm not sure we were playing well enough to deserve, combine those things and I think we just had a false sense of security about the second half."

Enterprise had a 2-1 edge at the break, but the Mustangs fought back in the second half.

The match was physical throughout, and Stanhope sliced the equalizer past a diving Zach Sheahan for a 2-2 tie on a shot after contact with 26:06 left in the match.

Sheahan defended the net and directed traffic well against the Mustangs, but Ladner said 

"We've been playing so well there haven't been a whole lot of shots taken against us," he said. "This may have been good for our goalie to get a game where he was called into action a lot."

The final goal came on a close shot with just minutes to play, and the Wildcats couldn't tie the score despite what their coach said was better play after the break.

"In the second half, I actually thought we played better soccer than we did the first half," Ladner said. "Somehow we gave up two goals, neither of which I thought should have been allowed. We gave them up nonetheless, even though I thought we were playing better soccer."

The Wildcats took a 1-0 lead on a penalty kick nine minutes into the match after Kyle Samuel was fouled in the box.

Kelan LeBlanc sent the penalty kick past the keeper to give EHS an early, 1-0 advantage.

"If their player hadn't taken (Samuel) down, I think he would have scored himself," Ladner said. "The referee awarded a penalty kick so Kelan buried it (with) no problems."

Sam Mazariegos sent a sharp shot into the back of the net with 11:26 to play before the half, and the Cats had a 2-0 lead.

After a diving save from Sheahan, the Mustangs scored for the first time off of a corner kick with 2:11 left before the break.

"The first half we scored two goals and we actually had the lead, but I didn't think we played very well in the first half," Ladner said. "I wasn't happy with our possession, but we scored two goals."

The narrow loss stung, but Ladner knows his players can build upon it.

"It's just one of those steps in the process where this was not our best game," he said. "We're missing a lot of players for injury and other reasons. It's right in the middle of a three-games-in-five-days series. It was an early-morning game. You can come up with all of these excuses. The bottom line is we didn't play well and we didn't play well enough to win. We've got to regroup from that and get better."