Boys soccer falls in Division 4 final
Piedmont High School’s boys soccer team fell behind early and couldn’t catch up, falling to Roseland University Prep 2-0 in the North Coast Section Division 4 championship game at Witter Field on March 1.
Miguel Valenzuea and Jonas Pena scored the goals for the Knights. The Highlanders played the final 32 minutes of the game (including extra time) a man up after an ejection but couldn’t get consistent offense going. Diego Figueroa made the saves when Piedmont was able to get shots on goal.
Valenzuela’s goal came in the ninth minute off of a corner kick. Angel Guzman sent a slow ball out behind the front line. Roseland ran a couple fakes until the ball came out the other side and Valenzuela sent it back the other way to the far corner past Lucas Malecki.
Piedmont’s Gianluca Bini (34) heads a shot while teammates Derin Sabuncuoglu (41) and Harper Mand (35) watch. The Highlanders were shut out 2-0 in the NCS Division 4 championship game. 
Piedmont’s Bosco Lorin (50) chases Roseland College Prep’s Miguel Santiago (10) during their NCS championship game at Witter Field. Roseland won, 2-0.
Piedmont’s Gianluca Bini said he had seen that play on the internet.
“I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw what was happening,” Bini said. “But it worked. That just means when we’re defending our corners, we’ve got to organize better. It’s just down to that. We should be paying attention.”
Highlanders coach Ben Russell said he wanted his team to make an aggressive counter attack on corner kicks.
“Fair play to them, they executed it well,” he said. “The hardest thing is that shot against your body to go to the far post. I felt they did that really well.
“If we can be a counter attack and being attacking the ball rather than just following the man and the shadow. That’s the mindset I want on that.”
Knights coach Jose Espinoza said the team has scored three goals on the play this year.
“We practice that almost every day,” Valenzuela said. “It just kept rolling. Just like how we practiced it.”
Ten minutes later, Roseland had another, again off a corner kick. The first shot was saved by Malecki but Pena was there to put it away.
Piedmont had chances with Figueroa making three terrific saves.
“He came up big and we’re really lucky to have him on the team,” Valenzuela said.
The Highlanders also had an advantage in corner kicks.
“They scored two corners from three in the first half,” Russell said. “We had seven corners in the first half and couldn’t get a shot on goal. The beautiful game is you have to take opportunities when they come, they took theirs, we didn’t take ours.”
But Piedmont never seemed quite right on offense, often having players hold onto the ball just a tick too long. Even when the Highlanders had the man advantage, their opportunities were sporadic.
“It got really rowdy out there, we got a little bit rattled, let the emotions get away a little bit,” Bini said. “It’s tough being a captain, watching your team fall apart a little bit like that. But I know it’s a learning moment.”
Piedmont’s Bosco Lorin (50) chases Roseland College Prep’s Miguel Santiago (10) during their NCS championship game at Witter Field. Roseland won, 2-0. 
Roseland University Prep’s Miguel Valenzuela (8) is defended by Piedmont’s Henry Devan (31) and Jimmy Lagios (37). Valenzuela scored the game’s first goal in a 2-0 Roseland University Prep victory. 
Rain came down during the second half of Roseland University Prep’s 2-0 win over Piedmont on March 1 at Witter Field.
The second half was mostly played in a rain storm.
The game went about as well as Espinoza could have wanted.
“Just being aggressive,” he said when asked about his gameplan. “Playing our game. Trying to finish it in the first half which happened. And then trying to control. I knew it was going to be a physical game. We know that we don’t have tall players. I knew it was going to be a high game. We got lucky on a couple of opportunities that they had. That was the objective. Trying to finish the first half and trying to hold.”
Both teams qualified for the California Interscholastic Federation Northern Regional playoffs. Piedmont is now 8-9-4 on the field on the season. Roseland is now 13-4-2.
“We’ll take this, and we’ll take the anger of not winning this game and put it in state and go as far as we can in that and that’s going to be a really hard tournament too, but we’ll see what we can do,” Bini said.