Boys’ Soccer: Sage Hill’s season ends
CORONADO — One of the first things the Sage Hill School boys’ soccer team noticed about the field at Coronado was its size.
“It’s as short as a 100-yard field,” Sage Hill Coach Luis Cruz said. “We’re used to playing on a minimum [length of] 115 or 120 [yards]. The boys learned the hard way three minutes in that one ball is basically in the box.”
Three minutes is how long it took top-seeded Coronado to strike in the semifinals of the CIF Southern California Regional Division IV playoffs on Thursday. The Islanders didn’t stop attacking the No. 5 Lightning, and when time expired, the hosts won, 7-0, ending Sage Hill’s season.
Coronado (18-6-1) advanced to the CIF Southern California Regional Division IV final and will play host to McFarland (21-3-5) on Saturday at 4 p.m. McFarland edged Sun Valley, 4-3, to set up a showdown between the top two seeds.
“A perfect game,” Cruz said it would have taken Sage Hill (16-11) to upset the Islanders and qualify for its first CIF Southern California Regional boys’ final in school history.
“We knew it was a short field. But we didn’t quite know how to use it and they did.”
The only thing the Islanders struggled with was the opening kickoff, having to redo it. Shortly afterward, they figured things out rather quickly.
Diego Ochoa opened up the scoring, dribbling into the box to beat the defense. Zach Burns, a center back, tried to slow down Ochoa, shoving him in the back. Goalkeeper Robbie Rosoff came out, but Ochoa struck the ball high for a nice goal in the third minute.
Four minutes later, Anthony Chonga almost scored in the same fashion as Ochoa. But his ball hit the crossbar and ricocheted back into play. Chonga found the back of the net midway through the first half, and twice more in the second half.
On his first goal, the junior used his head to get the ball past Rosoff. Tyler Gilmore, from the left, assisted on the goal, heading the ball to a nearby Chonga deep in the box.
The Islanders continued to press the issue, seeing Max McKee finish in a crowded box in the 27th minute. The goal was the first of two from McKee and it came on the Islanders’ ninth shot on goal. At the time, Sage Hill had only produced one shot, a free kick by center back Gordon Strelow near midfield. Keeper Auguste Melden handled the ball with ease.
Sage Hill never really challenged Melden or Coronado’s defense. Sage Hill was on its heels for most of the 80 minutes, trying to prevent the Islanders from running up the score.
“You can’t ask them to slow down. They have a final on Saturday,” Cruz said of the Islanders. “You cannot ask a competitive team to slow down. They got to keep getting ready. I can’t fault them for that.”
Only six teams have stopped Coronado this season, and half of those are powerhouse programs, Servite, the CIF Southern Section Division 1 champion, Los Angeles Loyola, a CIF Southern Section Division I semifinalist, and San Diego Cathedral Catholic, the CIF San Diego Section Open Division champion. Servite is ranked No. 4 in the state by Topdrawersoccer.com, and Loyola is No. 14 and Cathedral Catholic is No. 22.
“We haven’t had a loss in regulation since Dec. 19,” said Coronado Coach Brian Hiatt-Aleu, whose program has outscored its two CIF Southern California Regional opponents, 16-1, since losing to Cathedral Catholic in the opening round of the CIF San Diego Section Open Division playoffs on Feb. 24. “We’re 15-1-1 now with that loss to Cathedral [Catholic] in penalty kicks. That one hurt.
“One of our goals was to try to win the regional championship because that’s something we haven’t done before. We’ve been lucky to win [a] CIF [San Diego section title] six out of the last nine years, but that regional championship has escaped us.”
Sage Hill experienced the CIF SoCal Regional postseason for the first time. Cruz led the program to a 1-0 shutout at San Diego Montgomery in the opening round on Tuesday.
While the team’s second trip down south in three days wasn’t as successful, Cruz couldn’t have asked for more in his debut season with the Lightning. Sage Hill won its first undefeated Academy League championship in eight seasons and became the first to appear in the CIF Southern Section semifinals.
“I’m going to miss the seniors,” said Cruz, referring to Burns, Strelow, Nikolai Sadeghi, Anthony Gil, Juan Rodriguez, Milad Rohani, Dino Romeo, Amir Soleimany and Shayan Emtiaz. “They were a good group. They gave me a good welcome. But I think we have a great group of young boys coming up. Next year should be hopefully as good or better.
“It’s been a great season. They’ve set the bar at Sage Hill for the upcoming players and teams. Now they have a lot more to play for.”