Grizzlies ‘unlucky’ in second home loss
Granite Hills falls to 0-2 on season
Things just didn’t go in the Granite Hills High School girls soccer team’s favor in Wednesday evening’s non-league home game against Delano’s Cesar Chavez.
Playing for the second night in a row at home, the CIF Central Section Division VI Grizzlies (0-2) lost 1-0 to the Div. IV Titans (2-1). On Tuesday, Granite Hills lost 2-1 to Div. IV Mira Monte (2-0).
“Just a little bit unlucky [tonight],” first-year GHHS head coach Gabe Rodriguez said. “We had opportunities, we didn’t put them in. We hit the post, it didn’t go in. They hit the post and unfortunately for us, it went in. That’s the way that it goes, but I’m happy with our girls competing as hard as they did after playing last night.”
Near the 27th minute of the first half CCHS striker Katie Zamora charged down the left side of the field, got past a Granite Hills defender and took a shot from 10 yards away. The ball bounced off the right goal post and then into the left corner of the back of the net.
“That was a really tough team, but I think it was pretty even,” Rodriguez said. “They have some really quality players with a lot of speed and it bothered us tonight.”
Granite Hills controlled the ball well offensively and got the necessary stops on defense from players like Catalina Ballesteros, Cece Flores and goalkeeper Ismenis Hernandez to prevent Cesar Chavez from scoring or taking many shots. But outside of shot attempts from mostly Veronica Paz and Veronica Buckman, the Grizzlies struggled to finish close to the goal — something Rodriguez said the team will be working on over the next few days.
“We had a couple times when we had clear crosses and all we needed was that extra little touch and it just didn’t happen for us tonight, but it will, “Rodriguez said. “We’ll get there.” Rodriguez added that the team will also work on communication and ball possession.
“I thought sometimes we panicked and had time to bring the ball down and look around instead of panicking and trying to get rid of the ball,” he said. “Just slow the game down, you can’t ever recreate that at practice, but we’re going to do as much as we can during practice to simulate things like that.”
Granite Hills travels to Delano on Monday, Dec. 4 to play Div. III Kennedy (1-0) at 6 p.m.