GILROY—It was a tale of two halves for Gavilan against Cabrillo.
The first half, the Rams’ defense looked porous and left goalie Angel Trejo in too many one-on-one situations. The second half, however, it was solid.
The first half’s struggles were too much for Gavilan to overcome and it fell 7-2 to Cabrillo at home Tuesday to kick off Coast-North Conference play.
The Seahawks struck early and often in the first to take a 4-0 lead into half. Adrian Vasquez put the bread in the basket in the sixth minute off an assist from Juan Carlos Romo Cermeno. Andoni Trejo netted the next two for Cabrillo. He picked up a perfect pass from Seraphin Sparrow to find himself in a one-on-one battle in which Gavilan’s goalie had no chance and scored in the 32nd minute. Andoni struck again in 42nd minute on an unassisted goal and Vasquez scored the Seahawks’ final goal of the half just before the whistle was blown.
“I think it’s our fourth game where we gave up an early goal,” Gavilan coach Ricardo Espinosa said. “That kind of set the tone and their heads kind of dropped. We had a talk about how the next 45 minutes we make sure we tighten up.”
Cabrillo scored two quick goals after the break—unassisted scores from Andoni in the 51st and Joe Brian Hernandez in the 59th—but Gavilan was keeping Seahawks’ netminder Adrian Rondan busy on the other side of the field, too.
The always-dangerous Hibsen Tamayo-Davila was on the attack for Gavilan and finally broke through as the ball sailed just out of Rondan’s reach in the 62nd minute. The freshman cut Cabrillo’s lead to 6-2 as he breezed past Seahawk defenders for an unassisted goal in the 75th minute.
Tamayo-Davila said Gavilan’s cooler heads prevailed in the second half after it let its emotions get the best of it in the first.
“We started off slow and we were getting mad at each other too much,” he said. “We started getting pumped (after they scored) and felt more confident. More passes went through and everyone started getting pumped up.”
Gavilan was short handed when it scored its second goal. Jesus Vasquez was given a red card in the 70th minute, leaving the Rams vulnerable on defense.
Angel didn’t let Cabrillo’s man advantage get to him as he came up with back-to-back-to-back saves for the Rams. He made nine stops in the game.
“Honestly, what was going through my mind was ‘don’t let them score anymore goals’,” Angel said. “Four in the first half put us down a lot. Coming into the second half we just wanted to lower our errors. I tried to keep as many balls out of the goal as possible.”
Cabrillo would score once more on an unassisted goal from Cristian Gonzales in the 80th minute for the final.
Gavilan (1-4-2) continues conference play with a 4 p.m. game Friday at Ohlone. While the loss wasn’t pretty, Espinosa said the Rams need to put it behind them and stay focused on the rest of their season.
“It’s a very tough conference, so we’re going to get teams like this every week,” the Rams coach said. “We’re definitely going to tighten up on the defense. We know we can score, so if we can keep teams to one or two goals, we’ll be in there.”
