The Fremont boys soccer team kept pace atop the SCVAL-El Camino Division with a 2-1 win at Lynbrook on a rainy turf field Wednesday afternoon.
Coming off of a decisive 5-1 win against Cupertino, Fremont (7-3, 3-0) regarded this match as an important win in its conquest for the league championship title.
"Games like this are must-wins for us," Fremont coach Pedro Alexeeff-Torres said. "Lynbrook's a really strong, physical team and they've got quick players and sometimes you lose against teams like this so for us to win is very important today."
The odds were against the Firebirds early as the Vikings (2-7, 0-2) started out the first half strong, scoring the first goal of the game with junior captain Alex Wong assisting fellow junior captain Andrew Bae in a swift goal, giving the Vikings a 1-0 lead.
However, the Vikings' lead turned out to be short-lived. Later on in the first half, the Firebirds came up with a quick rally of their own with Carlos Vasquez scoring from a precise pass set up by Leonardo Silva to tie the game. The duo would repeat their stunt in the second half to take the lead against Lynbrook. The Vikings were unable to retaliate, leaving the Firebirds with the important victory.
With the victory, Fremont was able to keep pace with Palo Alto for first place in the division, setting up a showdown between the two teams on Friday.
“This [win] gives us a chance to go into Palo Alto on Friday and hopefully win that. If we can beat Palo Alto, we put ourselves in the driver's seat to win the league championship," Alexeeff-Torres said, "but this the game that was important for us because we were down 1-0 and came back and scored and to win the game [makes it] a significant win. Lynbrook gave us a really tough game.”
Despite the loss, Vikings head coach Joe Simas reflected upon strengths of the team during the game. “This is probably one of the better teams we will play [this season] and I felt like we played really well,” said Simas.
“It was a 1-1 tie [throughout the first half] and we were able to score first," Simas said, "but in the second half, we broke down a little bit.”
With a team consisting mainly of juniors and sophomores, Simas also believes that the team has gained a much needed experience from this game.
“We have really young and talented players, and with experience, it definitely would make a difference next time we play them," Simas said.
Lynbrook will look for its first win of the regular season Friday at Wilcox while Palo Alto and Fremont clash for the division lead in Sunnyvale.
