East Union’s Zach Hernandez got knocked to the ground on a corner kick from Trent Rivera early in the second half, but he did not let that stop him. Hernandez bounced up to find the ball and knocked it in the net for the first of three second-half Lancers goals on the way to a 5-0 East Union win at Manteca’s Guss Schmiedt Field and with it an undefeated Valley Oak League championship.
“I was going in for the header and I got pushed down,” Hernandez said. “But I got up and as soon as I did the ball was right there and I put it back in the net.”
Rivera had his second assist of the half for the last goal of the game when he got an indirect kick to Giovanni Ruelas to make the score 5-0.
“On the indirect kick, he (Ruelas) told me to flick it to the left side a little bit more so he could hit it to the near post,” Rivera said. “So, I rolled the ball to him and he hit the ball in the bottom left corner.
“On the corner, I just saw my teammates in the middle and we got it on that one.”
Arturo Galvan had a long direct kick to Victor Amorin in the 52nd minute and Amorin tapped the ball into the net for the other second half goal.
“We are playing well now,” East Union coach Edgar Zelaya said. “We knew Manteca was going to come hard because they had nothing to lose and to take away our undefeated season would be a good thing for them.
“So that’s what I told the boys and that they would have to start playing from the beginning, and they did. We controlled the game in the first half and we continued to do so in the second half, even when I went to the bench.”
It took 10 minutes for the Lancers (12-0-2 VOL, 17-1-4 overall) to score when Victor Hurtado got a rebound off of Hector Romero’s shot and blasted it in the net for a 1-0 lead. Giovanni Ruelas assisted Jesus Hurtado in the 32nd minute to give East Union a 2-0 halftime lead.
The Buffaloes dropped to 5-6-2 in league play and 11-8-3 overall.
“We just got outplayed,” Manteca coach Justin Coenenberg said. “They are a good team – they are in first place for a reason. They came out and jumped all over us and they were able to out-possess us and they forced us to chase.
“We consider ourselves a possession-based team and we were not able to possess and because of that they created opportunities on their offensive end and they were able to capitalize.”