Sports
BOYS/GIRLS SOCCER: Gilroy Boys and Girls Teams Stay Atop TCAL Standings
Both Mustangs soccer teams continue to lead their respective leagues heading into final stretch of regular season.
Despite ending up on the losing end of the score sheet, the Gilroy High boys soccer team learned a valuable lesson this week in a meeting against longtime rival Alisal High.
This group can adapt to whatever is in front of them.
Alisal avenged an early season 5-2 defeat to Gilroy, earning a 2-0 shutout win on Thursday.
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The defending league champs bottled up the dangerous Mustangs forwards for the majority of the 80-minute affair, but something changed in the final 20 minutes of play.
“Those last 20 minutes really opened our eyes,” Gilroy boys soccer coach Armando Padilla said. “I was really happy with the way we fought and continued to attack. Hopefully we can learn from that game and keep playing well to close out the season the right way.”
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Alisal added an extra defender in the back to open the rematch. The new defensive wrinkle neutralized the Gilroy speed on the outside and kept the scoring chances down in the early going.
“Of course you knew they (Alisal) were going to make adjustments,” Padilla said. “Unfortunately, we weren’t able to get one past them in the end. They slowed us down, but I was happy with the way things changed towards the end of the game.”
Coach Padilla credited junior defender Luis Galvan and senior forward Jorge Sanchez as key factors in the Mustangs late game turnaround.
Gilroy, now 10-3-2 overall and 6-1 in Tri County Athletic League play, holds a one game lead over Alisal with five games left to play.
The Mustangs square off against Palma on Monday.
On the girls side of things, the Gilroy High girls soccer team continued to stay red-hot, scorching it way past two more league foes this week.
Gilroy blanked Alisal 3-0 on Wednesday and blasted Notre Dame Salinas 7-0 on Friday to extend its winning streak to five games.
Holding a record of 7-0-2 in its last nine games, the Mustangs sit atop the TCAL with a near spotless 7-0-1 record in league and hold a 10-2-4 record overall.
Their last loss came way back on Dec. 18 against St. Francis High-Mountain View.
Sophomore Taylor Slattery leads the team with 17 goals this season, including a hat trick showing against Alisal this week.
Alexandria Maldonado, Cynthia Sanchez and Indra Garcia each scored two goals apiece in the rout two days later against ND-Salinas.
Gilroy hosts San Benito Tuesday night at Gilroy High.
