By Liliana Marquez
ELAC’s next home game will be this Friday versus Cerritos College at 6 p.m. at Weingart Stadium. The Huskies were also able to obtain a victory last week at Pasadena City College with a final score of 6-3, and with three goals by David Farias, two by Danny Suarez and one by Edwin Fajardo.
During the first half of the season, the Huskies faced Compton and were able to accomplish a victory of 4-2 over the Tartars. ELAC was looking for a sixth victory on conference play, while the Tartars were looking for their first win on conference. For the Huskies it was important to obtain another victory as the playoffs approach and as they prepare to face Cerritos who are currently the second ranked team statewide.
With three goals by Galo Moreno, a goal by Danny Suarez and another by Kevin Gomez, the Huskies frustrated the Tartars’ desire for victory. This result gave the Huskies an overall record of 11-4-4 and a conference record of 6-2-4.
An advantage for the Huskies, besides playing as locals, was the fact that the Tartars played with only ten men for about 50 minutes. The Tartars also made some mistakes and the Huskies took advantage of them.
ELAC was able to score an early goal during minute two, when Galo Moreno took the ball to the opposite side giving a left pass to Kevin Gomez. Gomez took the ball closer to the goal line, sending across to Moreno who jumped sending the ball directly into the net with a powerful header.
Ten minutes after that, The Huskies were able to extend the scoring when Kevin Gomez gave them a 2-0 lead. For Gomez this was his eighth goal on the season.
With two early goals in favor, and having control of the ball, ELAC was dominating the game. Despite the match not being as exciting as the ones the Huskies played before, the spectators enjoyed their performance.
At minute 27, ELAC had a good chance to score their third goal when David Farias failed to score after being face to face with the Tartars’ goalkeeper who rejected his shot. The ball fell into the path of another Husky who sent the ball over the crossbar awarding the Tartars a goal kick.
Over minute 32 came the first yellow card for the Tartars when one of their players committed a foul over Farias. Five minutes before the interval, Compton lost a man when he received a second yellow card causing him an expulsion after committing a foul over Moreno in the penalty area. The referee awarded the Huskies a penalty kick, and Moreno with a great execution gave the Huskies their third and final goal on first half.
At the start of the second half, the Huskies were playing with one more man than the Tartars but they still needed to take advantage of the space given and score more goals. Six minutes into the second half, Dean Ramos had a goal attempt with a powerful shot that went over the crossbar.
Over minute 55, ELAC’s Giovanni Reyes scored a goal that was disallowed after the assistant referee caught the Huskies on an offside position. Five minutes later the Huskies worked as a team and Galo Moreno scored his third goal in the match.
Suarez gave a pass to Moreno who was outside the box with no Tartars coming to defend, and without thinking, he kicked the ball scoring ELAC’s fourth goal. This was Moreno’s sixth overall goal and fifth on conference play.
At the 65-minute mark, Suarez had a good goal opportunity with a potent header that passed closed to the post. Four minutes later, a handball by the Tartars gave the Huskies another chance to extend the score when the referee awarded ELAC another penalty kick.
This time Suarez took the shot and scored the fifth and final goal for the Huskies. For Suarez this was his ninth goal of the season, keeping him as the current top scorer for the Huskies. “It was a good game. We used the space they gave us. We have to give credit to Compton because they played a man short for about 40 minutes,” said Head Coach Eddie Flores after the game.
Kevin Gomez who scored the second goal for the Huskies said that he felt great because the team is having a good season and that he hopes to score more goals than last season. Daniel Suarez was calm and happy with the result and said that the team had been working for this over the season, and showed himself happy for his teammate Moreno.
Galo Moreno who was able to score three goals was happy with his accomplishment, but above all with the victory. “We did what we had to do and didn’t make things hard for ourselves. I’m happy for myself and I hope I can keep improving,” said Moreno.