Jesuit hands Davis non-league loss
By Thomas Oide,
HUB staff writer–
There is a reason why Jesuit is ranked fifth in the nation by the National Soccer Coaches Association. In a tough matchup between two of the perennial soccer powers in the region, the Marauders played excellent defense and offense throughout the whole 80 minutes, to come out on top, beating the Blue Devils by a score of 4-0.
There were some questionable calls in the game, and one of these calls proved costly for DHS. In the 11th minute, DHS goalkeeper Derek Pleasants came off his line to challenge a charging Tucker Bone for a fifty-fifty ball in Pleasants’ box. Bone volleyed the ball miles over the goal and was taken out by a sliding Pleasants.
“I came out for the ball. The Jesuit guy definitely hit the ball before he flipped over me; everyone on our side of the field could see that,” Pleasants said.
It then became interesting. The referee immediately ran over to Pleasants and reached into his pocket, pulling out his yellow card. Jesus Gutierrez was forced to enter the game because the rules state that any player receiving a yellow card has to be subbed off.
The foul was in the box, so Jesuit was awarded a penalty kick.
Marauder captain, Niko Hansen converted the penalty, coolly placing the ball in the lower left hand corner.
Seven minutes later, in the 18th minute, Hansen played a perfect ball to a streaking Bone, who promptly put the ball in the back of the Davis net. Marauders two, Devils nil.
The Devils kept the game exciting with chances of their own, but couldn’t convert on them.
Strikers D.J. Villegas, Alex McIntyre, and Collin Klein all had shots on target. In fact, Villegas recorded the first shot of the game, a curling strike that unfortunately went straight into the keeper’s hands.
The Devils kept it close until the 70th minute, when Hansen sliced and diced Devil defenders off a counter-attack, found himself in a one on one situation with Pleasants, and finished the chance to put Jesuit ahead 3-0.
In the 75th minute, the Marauders put the game away, by scoring a goal off a great service capping off their scoring spree at four.
After this tough loss for the Devils, there is still time to turn things around to hopefully see the Marauders again in section playoffs.
“After this game, there will be a great boost in our motivation, our goal is to get to sections to see them again,” Villegas said.
Head Coach Alex Park agreed, “I think we learned a lot in this game. My goal as a coach is to get our team to sections but in order to get there; we need to focus on winning the league first.”
“This loss makes us want to see them and beat them in sections,” Pleasants said. “We’ll bring it to them next time.”
