Oakland SC Earns 3 Points in its Home Opener
The fledgling NPSL side earned three points in their second league match, with a 4-2 victory over Contra Costa FC at Oakland Technical High School.
Oakland SC got on the board first, as former Oakland Roots and Santa Clara University Midfielder Dylan Autran headed home a corner kick in the 33rd minute. They doubled their lead 4 minutes later, when Julio Cervantes made a run to the far post. His first shot attempt was saved off the line by a Contra Costa defender, but Cervantes grabbed the rebound and put it in.
Contra Costa grabbed one back in the 60th minute, when a long ball out of the back was headed into the path of Cal’s Alonzo Del Mundo, whose left-footed one-timer gave goalkeeper Kevin Esquivel no chance.
Oakland regained a two-goal advantage in the 78th minute, when Robert Morini’s shot from well behind the midfield line caught Contra Costa goalkeeper Jeremy Zielinski by surprise. But Contra Costa responded again, when Cal’s Nate Carrasco converted a penalty kick in the 87th minute, after a long through ball resulted in a hand ball by an Oakland defender.
Oakland wrapped up the match in the 91st minute, when an attacker was taken down in the penalty area and Autran converted the penalty kick to earn a brace.
Farolito Earns First Win Over Winless Stompers
El Farolito earned its first points of the season with a 4-0 win over the Oakland Stompers at Boxer Stadium. The San Francisco side scored three goals in the first 25 minutes and never looked back.
Herlbert Soto opened the scoring in the 12th minute and Erik Arias scored a brace with goals in the 17th and 25th minutes. Farolito’s Ricardo Delgado scored the only goal of the second half in the 68th minute.
Napa Overwhelms Academica
Not even a brief power outage could slow down Napa Valley 1839 FC in their 3-0 victory over visiting Academica SC.
Dario Pavon scored a brace in less than two minutes to enable Napa to jump out to an early lead. In the 10th minute, Pavon grabbed a loose ball at the left side of the penalty area, cut back to his left, and squeezed his shot into a tight space between goalkeeper David Hernandez and the post. The goal was set up by a give-and-go between Luis Mendoza and Joseph Restani.
In the 12th minute, a long ball out of the back was deflected to Pavon just beyond the penalty arc and he avoided a tackle by Matthew Rodriguez. Hernandez rushed out to challenge him, but Pavon’s right-footed shot sailed past his left arm and into the net.
Restani closed out the scoring in the 37th minute when he headed home a corner kick. The former Saint Mary’s star had a strong debut for Napa, after spending the past two seasons with the Oakland Roots and their development club, Project 51O.
There was no scoring in the second half, but Academica’s evening of frustration continued when Beni Mejia was red carded for an elbow to the face of Javi Alcarria in the 85th minute.
“We knew it was gonna be a tough game tonight,” Napa Head Coach Mark Corbett said after the match. “They’re a good side, they won the league last year. We started fast, we hadn’t done that the previous two times we played them last year. The message was to start fast and we ended up getting off to a two goal lead in the first fifteen minutes.”
Davis Wins Battle of Unbeatens
Host FC Davis beat Sonoma County Sol FC by a score of 1-0 on a header by Alec Sundly in the 53rd minute. The match was the first meeting between the two teams since eight-seeded Sonoma knocked top seeded Davis out in the first round of the playoffs. It was very cleanly played, with neither side receiving any cautions from the referee.
Next Week
Next week’s matches include the first installment of a new Oakland derby as Oakland SC travels to West Oakland to take on the Stompers.
The three clubs that are tied for the league lead face stiff road tests, as FC Davis makes its way to Turlock to take on Academica SC, Napa Valley 1839 meets El Farolito at Boxer Stadium, and Sacramento travels to Concord on Sunday to take on Contra Costa.
