Boys Soccer: Cathedral Tops La Salle

The  boys soccer team hasn’t hit too many bumps in the road this season.

Unfortunately for the Lancers, Wednesday night was one of those bumps as host Cathedral spoiled a fine effort on the part of the Lancers in a 2-1 Del Rey League loss.

“I can’t fault the boys’ effort. I thought our play was real good,” La Salle coach Dan Sheridan said. “I really felt we outplayed them. Last time they took it to us. The reality is you have to put it in the net.”

La Salle (17-4, 4-4 in the DRL) caught the Phantoms (17-1-5, 8-0) by surprise just four minutes into the match.

Senior midfielder Gio Luna’s corner kick went straight across the goal box to Andrew Powers, who put a right foot on the ball to beat Cathedral goalie Brian Paredes.

Cathedral, ranked No. 2 in the CIF-Southern Section Division IV poll, wasted little time getting one back.

In the sixth minute, Cathedral’s Edwin Corona tested La Salle goalie Garrett Kubon from well outside the goal box and was successful.

“Our goalie, I think thought he was going to pass it and he shot it and got caught off his line,” Sheridan said.

After the two teams were tied at halftime, Cathedral came out on the attack right away in the second half.

In the 46th minute, Victor Ramirez did what Corona had done in the first half. From about 30 yards out he was able to beat a stunned Kubon with a solid shot.

“Our kids are very skillful and when they see an opportunity they take advantage of it,” Cathedral co-coach Arturo Lopez said. “We don’t have one or two, we have a few who can score from 20 or 30 yards out. That’s one of our strengths. We score quite a few goals from outside the box.”

La Salle nearly tied things up in the 48th minute as Gianmarco Gilatti’s left-footed shot inside the goal box just missed the upper left corner of the goal.

The Lancers threatened again in the 60th minute when a free kick cross by Luna pulled Paredes off his line with the ball in front of the goal box. But the Cathedral defense was able to clear the ball out just a few yards off of the goal line.

Cathedral also had chances to extend its lead.

In yet another long-distance effort, Cathedral’s Chris Argueta nearly scored on a free kick only to have Kubon come up with a diving save to his left. Kubon came up big once again in the 71st minute on a long-distance shot from Chris Aguinaga.

 “Our defense was very organized. They really didn’t get behind us at all,” Sheridan said. “They’re the No. 2 seed and we’ve played them tough twice.”

La Salle had one last chance in injury time to tie things. On a free kick from 30 yards out Gio Luna narrowly missed the left post.