Terra Nova Tigers come roaring back vs Nueva

“They made adjustments in the second half,” Terra Nova head coach Dave Downing said. “We definitely got a little out-physicaled. It’s a young team. So, we have had our instances of teams being a little bit more physical. They came out in the second half, played a lot tougher game.”

For Templin, the visiting game at Skyline was something of a homecoming. Not only is the San Bruno college campus closer to Terra Nova than it is to Nueva School, the field itself is familiar to the Terra Nova senior, who plays there frequently with her SF Glens Academy club team.

“This field is where I’ve had some of my best games,” Templin said. “So ... it’s kind of like my good-luck charm.”

Templin’s “buckle-in” celebration dance was in midseason form after booting the go-ahead score in the 54th minute on a long pass from junior midfielder Ava Annino. Templin weaved through two defenders to chase down the through ball, and burst through the seam to accelerate into the box and win the 1-v-1 with Nueva goalkeeper Ava Jalali.

“It’s one of my better traits about my soccer,” Templin said of her footspeed. “But, really, that pass was so good. My teammates know how to feed me the ball, and that I can get those balls, it’s nice. My teammates are just so great at that. It makes my job much easier.”

It was Templin’s first goal of the year, after the senior missed the first two games of the season while recovering from a concussion she sustained in mid-August during a club game. She did help the Tigers get on the board her first game back, Dec. 6, in a 1-0 win over Pajaro Valley, sending a key pass to sophomore Dani Guterres, who delivered an assist pass to sophomore Claire Moore for the game-winning goal.

“Since then I haven’t had any points on the board,” Templin said. “So, this game was really like my comeback game from my concussion. And it felt really good.”

Terra Nova’s second wave of attacking midfielders proved pivotal in backing up the team’s star scorer. Both Templin’s assists were off rebounds after her shot attempts. The Tigers got on the board in the 49th minute, as Templin fired a high shot off the crossbar that bounced straight down, and out, only for Moore to follow up and tap it in to tie it 1-all.

Then in stoppage time, sophomore Nina Alexiev followed to walk in a Templin bolt fended off by Jalali.

“We always say once a shot goes in, we need to make sure we follow up,” Downing said. “So, our midfielders are pretty hungry about scoring. So, when the ball does go, our forwards send a shot to the goal, we hope our midfielders are there.”

Nueva strikes first

Unlike Terra Nova’s long layoff, Nueva (3-1-1) was playing Saturday in the second game of a back-to-back. The Mavericks were coming off an 11-0 win Friday over KIPP Esperanza-Palo Alto in Private School Athletic League play.

“If [Friday] was a really competitive game, then we wouldn’t do it,” Nueva head coach Daniel Zerabruk said. “However, it’s almost like practice. That’s the kind of the intensity of those games. It’s not so high. Not ideal (to play on back-to-back days), of course. We’d like to have some time to recover. I don’t think that affected our performance in any way. I think we played a really good game.”

Nueva’s blowout win Friday paid dividends against Terra Nova, as junior forward Miriam Hershenson scored on a cross just before halftime to give her team a 1-0 lead in the 34rd minute. Freshman attacking wing Neela Prabhu facilitated the score with a brilliant advance up the left side, chasing down a pass toward the sideline and redirecting it into play to control it with a tempo. Prabhu angled in several steps before timing her cross pass to Hershenson, who connected for a left-footed tap past the dive of the Terra Nova goalkeeper.

“That’s the benefit of playing the day before, I guess,” Zerabruk said. “The game before, we had some of our restrictions to score, because obviously we respect that the opposition might not be at our level. So, we had some restrictions, and one of the restrictions was scoring from crosses from wide positions. So, we engineered that action kind of a lot in [Friday’s] game. So, it really came together today.

“So, Miriam happened to have a great execution of that shot, sweeping into the far corner with her weaker foot, which we spoke about yesterday,” he said. “So, it was great to see that come together today.”

Prabhu is part of Nueva’s next generation, one of two freshmen on roster, along with midfielder Aviva Stein. The Mavericks’ six seniors — including attacking midfielder Juliet Chen, and twin sisters Nancy and Patrice Graham-Martinez — all took a similar path as four-year varsity players, who led Nueva to a then program-record 16 wins their freshman year, before breaking it last season with 19 wins.

“I always knew this was going to be one of the special groups of Nueva,” Zerabruk said. “Because it’s rare to have such a strong group of talented players, and ... four of them were already starters their freshman year.”

The buckle-in dance, a how-to

Templin borrowed the buckle-in dance from the Terra Nova football team, after she played on the junior-varsity gridiron as the Tigers’ kicker her sophomore year. The team had an array of celebration dances, and Templin took a liking to her now signature move.

The dance starts with Templin taking both hands and raising them beside her head like she’s grabbing a giant seatbelt. Then, as though she’s bucking up, she swings both hands down vertically in celebration.

“It means the game is locked down and we won,” Templin said. “So, my first (soccer) game ... sophomore year, I scored the first goal of the season ... and then I just went like this (as she does the strap-in dance), and it’s been my thing since then.”