Sequoia roars back to top South City

It was a must-win showdown for Sequoia in the team’s quest to qualify for the Central Coast Section playoffs, entering play in fifth place in the Peninsula Athletic League Bay Division, 3 points back of South City. And after trailing by a goal at halftime, the Ravens (4-3-1 PAL Bay, 9-4-1 overall, 13 points) rallied back for a 2-1 victory, moving into a fourth-place tie with South City, lending gravitas to Rodriguez’s first varsity head-coaching win.

 “It’s a great feeling because, for one, you step into someone else’s shoes, someone else’s role, and you don’t want to disappoint,” Rodriguez said. “So the fact that I was able to keep the boys on track … I’ll remember it for that.”

With the top three placers in the PAL Bay Division standings guaranteed a CCS bid, Sequoia and South City each trail third-place Menlo-Atherton with five league games to go.

South City (4-4-1, 13 points, 5-7-1) could have moved into a third-place tie with a win, and looked well on its way after 40 minutes of play. The Warriors scored in the second minute when senior forward Berto Marquez challenged Sequoia’s keeper, who got a little too cute dancing around with the ball at his feet, only to have Marquez sprint in as he at last tried to pick it up and boot it past him for the score.

Sequoia answered in the second half, though. The Ravens scored the equalizer on an own-goal off a South City defender from a shot played in by junior Erik Espinoza. Ten minutes later, senior midfielder Lukas MacFarlane Glasow scored the game-winner from the top corner of the penalty box.

“We have a challenge to make CCS playoffs,” South City assistant coach Manny Rodriguez said. “We’re just missing that one extra step to finish the game we want to. We lost many opportunities where we’ve been up … so we definitely have a team that competes. Hopefully within these last five league games we turn that switch and have success for our last five games.”

MacFarlane Glasow’s go-ahead score was a thing of beauty. The play developed in the corner with South City in possession when Eric Linares charged in to win it. The senior passed it back along the sideline to senior Simon Clarke, who sent it to the top of the box for MacFarlane Glasow who sent it to the back post.

“It was a hard shot,” MacFarlane Glasow said. “I was facing away from the goal and I was running away from the goal at the same time. Then I had to wrap my foot around the ball and had to put some curl, and … some whip on it to get it past the goalie … I was a little in disbelief. But I just wanted to get back to the half line so we could get the game back going.”

South City had one last late chance go by the wayside when a 1-on-1 look was just off the mark. Sophomore midfielder Diego Arellano drove the right side and sent a pass in for forward Gael Blancas to control it with his back to the goal. Blancas was able to turn and deliver a shot out of the reach of the diving goalkeeper, but the attempt struck the right post and careened out.

“That was our last actual chance we had in the game,” Manny Rodriguez said.

It was simply the way the ball bounced for the Warriors in the second half. South City’s goalkeeper had a bead on Espinoza’s shot but one the Warriors defenders, already turned around and facing the goal, got between Espinoza and the keeper and reacted to the shot by trying to deflect it. But the ball looped off his foot, over the head of the keeper and in to tie it 1-1.

“We were playing good up until then,” Manny Rodriguez said. “When that happened it kind of gave them momentum and dropped us a little bit. We tried fighting back. We had a couple good opportunities. I feel the first half was ours and the second half was theirs. I think they just wanted it a little bit more than we did.”

That was actually part of Sequoia’s game plan, to avoid the long ball and force mistakes, Oscar Rodriguez said.

“It goes to show if you stick to the plan, eventually the results will come,” Oscar Rodriguez said.

Oscar Rodriguez is in his first year at Sequoia but previously coached three years at Half Moon Bay as the boys’ junior-varsity head coach.