GILROY—Christopher’s Esteban Fabela was easy to miss during Tuesday night’s game.
In the blink of an eye, the speedy junior raced from one side of the field to the other and delivered the ball into the back of the Latino College Preparatory Academy goal before the Eagles even knew what hit them.
And he did that four times.
Fabela’s four goals were instrumental in lifting the Cougars to a 10-4 win over LCPA at home and helped them rebound from last week’s tough loss to Palma.
The Eagles seem to be play with a chip on their shoulder after losing to Christopher 16-6 earlier in the season. The LCPA defense crowded the net, leaving little space for the Cougars, but Fabela still found a way to score.
“It’s always nice to get on the board and help out your team,” the Cougar midfielder said. “They played a lot better than last time. I guess if you beat them pretty good the first time then they kind of come in a little hot headed, but we played our game.”
Fabela got Christopher off to a strong start, scoring to the opposite side of the Eagles’ net just over a minute into the game.
Both sides played with physical defense, but Fabela and the Cougars fought through it. He poked the ball through a flock of Eagles with 4:32 left in the first quarter to improve Christopher’s lead to 2-0.
Moments later, the Eagles’ goalie tried to scoop up the ball, but missed and the Cougars’ Andrew Busch was there to grab it. The net was left wide open for Busch, who made the easy goal to put his team up 3-0 at the end of the first quarter.
Fabela flaunted his speed in the early minutes of the second quarter. He stole the ball, charged down field and fed it to Busch, who finished the play with a goal. Just moments later, Fabela struck again and scored while racing past the net for his third goal of the game, giving Christopher a 5-0 lead.
Then things got messy for the Cougars.
Four penalties left them short handed in the second quarter and the Eagles took full advantage. They scored two unanswered goal before Fabela recorded his fourth—through the LCPA goalie’s five-hole—to put his team up 6-2.
The Eagles got it right back, however, scoring with 1:12 left in the half cut Christopher’s lead to 6-3 at halftime.
“It’s pretty easy to get that stick up in the air and anything to the head, (the refs are) pretty cautious about that nowadays with concussions and everything—and rightfully so,” Cougar coach Tim Pirozzoli said. “It’s definitely something we need to be working on; it’s a work in progress.”
The Cougars hammered the Eagles with three shots on goal in the first minute of the second half, but were unable to squeak the ball through. LCPA returned the favor, taking its share of shots in the early going, but the Cougars’ tight defense acted like a brick wall and didn’t allow anything through.
Jordan Padilla notched the first goal of the second half, jumping to find space and scoring while in the air with just over seven minutes left in the third quarter.
More than four minutes had passed before another goal was scored and this time, it belonged to LCPA.
Christopher’s Zack Cefalu and Michael Sosa got the momentum back in their teams favor with two quick goals in two very different fashions.
Cefalu struck at close range, firing a shot right in front of the net for a score. Sosa, on the other hand, scored to the far corner from around 20 yards out.
“I thought we played a pretty good game,” Cefalu said. “We worked the ball around a lot. We didn’t score as many as we’d have liked to, but we still came out with the win, so it was good.”
Padilla notched the final goal for Christopher just two minutes into the fourth quarter. He again scored in the air off a pass from teammate Evan Essary.
“Overall they’re getting more cohesive as a team,” Pirozzoli said. “That’s probably one of the biggest things moving forward is that they work together as a team. They have to win and lose as a team and realize the importance of that.”
The 6-2 Cougars—4-2 in league—have a quick turnaround as they travel to Aptos to take on the Mariners at 7 p.m. today.
“They’ve (the Mariners) been around for awhile and they’ve got some good, strong, skilled players,” Pirozolli said. “We just have to be ready to play lacrosse like we know how to play it and control the game.”
