Gauchos overwhelm Panther back line with speed

Trichelle Larkins doesn’t have the luxury of a lot of depth.

A good portion of the Pacheco girls soccer coach’s bench consists of kids with little soccer experience.

It’s forced Larkins to get creative in trying to save her starters’ legs. One such tactic has been to play a very high defensive line with hope of compacting the field and denying opponents the opportunity to run them into the ground.

The offside trap has allowed the Panthers to stay competitive in games they might otherwise have been out of, but it also leaves the susceptible to teams with speed. El Capitan showed how on Monday afternoon.

It took the young Gauchos about 20 minutes to adjust to Pacheco’s defensive approach, but once they did, they won virtually every foot race. Sophomore striker Bryna Vega netted a first-half hat trick as El Capitan scored five unanswered goals to pick up a 6-2 Western Athletic Conference road victory.

“It’s very weird coming from Merced and being in a situation where you have no senior leadership,” Gauchos coach Christina Schiewek said. “We don’t always have the composure we need to have because of it.

“We do have speed to spare, though. When we use it right, that can help compensate for some of our inexperience. The next step is to be a little more consistent with our finishing, but because of all that speed, we are creating plenty of chances.”

That was certainly the case on Monday as the Gauchos (2-2, 2-1 WAC) had to fight back from early Pacheco (0-6, 0-2 WAC) goals by Alexa Terran and Alexis Camarillo.

Vega had an almost immediate answer each time, however. She won a ball at the halfway line and pulled free for a breakaway in the seventh minute and then stole and finished a bad goal kick to tie the score 2-2 in the 20th minute.

The El Cap pace took over the game from there.

Vega completed her hat trick five minutes later, pouncing on a rebound inside the 6-yard box. Taylor Cottrell then broke the game open with a pair of goals four minutes apart to make it 5-2 at the break. Lyah Castleberry finished things off, blasting a ball top shelf from the left wing in the 73rd minute.

“The high line wasn’t expected at all, but we kept playing as a team and figured it out,” Vega said. “It definitely played into what we like to do. If we’re passing the ball to feet and moving quick off of it, we can usually outrun teams.”

The scoreline could have easily been double digits if not for a tremendous effort from Pacheco goalkeepers Jacky Garcia and Sabrina Soares. The pair combined for 17 saves while turning away multiple breakaways.

“We definitely didn’t play our game today,” Larkins said. “It was a good start, getting the two early goals, but we stopped playing. Until these girls are willing to give effort for the full game, we’re not going to win.”

This story was originally published March 17, 2015 at 4:06 PM with the headline "Gauchos overwhelm Panther back line with speed."