Othello Soccer beats Royal, drops matches to Ellensburg and Prosser

The Huskies have a lot of ground to make up if they expect to qualify for postseason play having dropped league matches to Prosser and Ellensburg last week. Othello was in both contests, but fell behind late in both and was unable to come away with W’s.

The Huskies were shutout 2-0 in their CWAC league opener with Ellensburg at home Tuesday, Sept. 26. Despite losing six players to injury, Othello kept fighting to the final whistle.

The Bulldogs scored their first goal on a penalty kick by Haylee Cantu at the 18th minute of the fuss.

“It (the penalty) was a controversial call,” coach Bernie Garza said. “Ellensburg’s forward then scored on a low shot to the right side. Our keeper Giselle Monroy had no chance to stop the goal.”

Othello had opportunities to level the match before the half, but couldn’t covert on a goal kick or get shots past the Ellensburg keeper, and the Bulldogs held on to their slim 1-0 lead at the break.

Ellensburg pushed the score to 2-0 when Cantu squeezed in a high ball just under the elbow of the far post with a little more than 10 minutes left in the contest.

The odds of mounting any type of a comeback were slim to none throughout he match for the home team as Othello saw a half-dozen players go down with injuries.

“All the injuries happened on hard fouls by the Ellensburg players. But I don’t blame the opposing teams players, they were just playing soccer aggressively,” Garza said. “But the referee did let the game get way out of hand in the second half – did nothing about it until late in the game where he showed two yellow cards to Ellensburg players for dangerous play. None of the Othello players retaliated or got yellow cards as they played a hard fought clean game.”

Prosser 3

Othello 2

PROSSER — The Huskies went into the match with the Mustangs Thursday, Sept. 28 down six starters who were out with injuries suffered in the game with Ellensburg, and nearly pulled out the win.

“We had to move four players up from the bench and use a couple of JV players, but actually did quite well considering the circumstances,” Garza said. “We had the game under control until the subs and JV players got tired because they were not used to playing so much and made some silly mistakes.”

Prosser got on the board first in the nine minute of the fuss.

“We had a miscommunication on the defensive side as expected as we had three different players playing there,” Garza said. “But we responded right back in the 20th minute when Rilee Heist dribbled around her player and took a hard shot from about 20 yards out and it deflected off a defender and went if for the game tying goal.”  

The match was knotted 1-1 at the break.

Othello when up 2-1 on a goal from Jazlyhn Verduzco late in the second half.

“We scored off a give and go sequence by Jazlyhn and Rilee Heist,” Garza said. “Jazlyhn put in a rocket of a shot from the top of the 18-yard box and with 15 minutes left to go in the match.”

The Mustangs responded with two goals in the last 10 minutes of the contest to pull out the come from behind win.

“We outshot them 19-10 but could not score in the final minutes to tie it up,” Garza said. “We needed to be able to manage the time late in the game and sneak out with a win, but our players lost focus and were really tired as they had fought all game long with hardly any subs and it showed in the last 15 minutes when we gave up the two decisive goals.”

Othello 3

Royal 0

The Huskies bounced back with a shutout win in a friendly with the Knights Saturday.

Sammy Garza scored the first goal of her career in the 4th minute off an assist from Jazlyhn Verduzco.

“Jazlyhn dropped the ball to Sammy and she scored from about 30 yards out in the upper right corner of the net. Gracie Sorenson playing with a hurt ankle then scored in the 9th minute off a direct kick just outside the 18 yard box blasting a shot straight down the middle right over the wall. The goalie had no time to react to the ball and put us up 2-0,” Gazra said. “In the 10th minute Emily Mendez took a long through ball from Rilee Heist and outran the Royal City defense and maneuvered the ball around the last defender and scored far post to beat the Royal City keeper.” 

The Huskies got back to league play Tuesday at Grandview, but the results were not available at press time.