On Friday afternoon, Sequoia’s varsity men’s soccer team slipped past Carlmont with a narrow 1-0 victory. Tensions were high as the two teams fought for the win, but Sequoia came out with the upper hand.

During the first half of the game, Carlmont’s offense maintained pressure on the opposing team’s defense, and kept the ball on Sequoia’s half of the field for the majority of the time. Michel Gonzalez had numerous break aways and shots on goal, but Seqouia’s defense remained nearly impeccable the whole way through. At halftime, the game was still scoreless, and it looked as though the whole game could have gone scoreless if neither team changed their strategies.

Jodi Beloff, head coach of the boys varsity soccer team, pointed out that, “we were supposed to take advantage of the flanks… but we just couldn’t get the ball in to their net.”

However, a few minutes in to the second half of the game, Sequoia caught Carlmont’s defense off guard and swiftly advanced toward our goal. The ball slowly slipped through Carlmont goalie Jared Fitzpatrick’s fingers and rolled into our net.

After that point, Carlmont’s defenders including Eric Smith, Ryan Freeman, and Justin Quan all stepped up and did not give Sequoia any more chances to score. However, their efforts proved to be too little too late, because Sequoia’s equally impenetrable defense did not give up any opportunities for Carlmont to score.

Looking forward, Beloff hopes that, “we will get a lot more wins in the bottom half of the season, and finish strong… And as for the rivalry: the rivalry continues.”