The Owls placed first overall in the Condor League, earning them a first-round seat in the CIF tournament.

The Owl’s first CIF opponent, Thacher, was aggressive. It was a physical game, making it tough to hold possession of the ball. The Owls scored first, making the game 1-0 in the first half. However, Thacher answered with a corner kick that tied the game 1-1 at halftime.

The second half was a battle for both sides: the Owls were trying to calm down and pass the ball while Thacher was trying to counter-attack the Laguna defense. Finally, after many chances, the whistle blew and the game was still tied, but there had to be a winner. The game went into overtime with the standing rule of golden goal, which means the first team to score wins.

After a hard fought eight minutes, Thacher had the ball in the Laguna box and both teams were fighting for possession of the ball. After several seconds of contact that resulted in four Owls on the ground, the ball rolled into the net, and to everyone’s surprise, the only whistle that came marked the end of the game. “Soccer is sometimes pictured as having a team destroy another one and that’s the reason why the end result is what it is. In our case, I think it was an almost even game. I thought we were the better team, but sometimes the [team] who gets destroyed gets one chance and capitalizes and that happens. Unfortunately, that was our situation and the better team didn’t end up on top,” Coach Shertzer said.