Stoppage time leads to Casa Grande win, more Petaluma frustration

The Petaluma High School boys varsity soccer team had to work overtime all last week.

It paid off with more frustration.

In their final home game of the season on Oct. 21, the Trojans had a 1-0 lead after 80 minutes of regulation time against crosstown rival Casa Grande, yet weren’t able to pull off an upset win. The Gauchos’ Max Chappell scored the game-tying goal on a penalty kick in the fourth minute of stoppage (or injury) time following regulation, then teammate Tommy Murphy tallied the eventual game-winning goal in the second minute of stoppage time in the first of two 10-minute overtimes.

Two nights later in Healdsburg, Petaluma again lost a 1-0 lead and played into overtime. The Trojans settled for a 1-1 tie, but they couldn’t score in the final 37 minutes of the match with a man advantage after a Greyhounds’ player was red-carded in the second half at the 63-minute mark.

The back-to-back OT games left Petaluma with a 5-13-4 overall record, 3-7-1 in Sonoma County League action, with a season-ending game at undefeated Windsor this week.

The loss to Casa Grande was Petaluma’s most difficult defeat of the season. Both sides were upset with the inconsistency of the officiating crew.

The Petaluma-Casa Grande game started with plenty of niceties. Petaluma, in its last home game of 2009, first introduced the nine seniors on the Gauchos team — Murphy, Chappell, Carlos Mejia, Erik Cruz, Michel Noe, Diego Jaramillo, Alex Tarantino, Roberto Rosilia and Kevin Werckmann. They shook hands with the seven Petaluma seniors in uniform — co-captains David Tange and Colin Page, plus Austin Kois, Michael Ranis, Juan “Popcorn” Gonzalez, Michael Gotham and Jose Arango — as they were introduced with their parents. They, along with senior Victor Sanchez, were recognized in well-crafted signs made by David Rabbitt, father of Petaluma sophomore defender Patrick Rabbitt.

The friendly pre-game pomp and circumstance evolved into an intensively physical and exciting game. Petaluma missed a chance to take an early lead when a Kois’ shot hit the left post. A shot from Carlos Mejia wound up hitting the crossbar to keep Casa from jumping ahead in the final minute of the first half.

Goalkeepers Page and Adam Thomason of the Gauchos matched each other in saves until Petaluma sophomore Roberto Mejia trapped a long pass by Tange and dribbled right to beat the Casa Grande defense and Thomason for a 1-0 lead 11 minutes into the second half.

Petaluma preserved that lead, in part because of a couple of great defensive efforts by Riley Gang and Tange, who is playing his fourth and final year on the Petaluma varsity squad.

Page deflected a potential game-tying shot by Cruz with five minutes left in the game, but Casa (11-9-2, 5-6-1 in SCL), trying to keep its playoff hopes alive, kept pressing. The Gauchos’ determination and persistence got the desired results.

Tange and Gotham were both hurt six minutes apart late in the game, and helped off the field, creating stoppage time. Casa capitalized on the second chance when Jaramillo drew a foul in the box, resulting in a penalty kick by Chappell at the 84th minute of the game.

It was the second time this season the Gauchos escaped a potential loss to Petaluma with a last-second penalty goal. In a preseason tournament at Tamalpais High School in August, Mejia forged a 1-1 tie with a penalty kick.

This time, by league rules, the game went into overtime. In the first 10-minute extra session, though there were no serious injuries, Casa Grande scored in injury time. It happened when numerous players converged on a great long ball by Gauchos’ junior defender John Greene. The ball popped free onto the right foot of Murphy, who beat Page for what proved to be the game winner.

Petaluma appeared to recover from that bitter loss in Healdsburg, as it dominated play in the first half on Friday night, yet it ended in a scoreless tie. Trojans’ coach Greg Lamansky coached the game from the back row of the bleachers, behind the Petaluma bench, and it looked good from his vantage point in the second half, after sophomore Garren Langford gave the Trojans a 1-0 lead off an incredible throw-in from the side by classmate Rabbitt.

That lead was short-lived. The Greyhounds’ Omar Nuno tied the score just one minute later but, four minutes after that, Petaluma got a break when a Healdsburg player, freshman Jordan Vega, was given a red card, forcing the home team to play the rest of the game a man down.

The Greyhounds (10-8-1, 3-7-1), though shorthanded, had more serious scoring opportunities through regulation and overtime. Eli Asay and Tyler Metten had potential game-saving defensive plays toward the end of regulation, then Tange prevented a game-winning goal by using his speed to recover and block a Healdsburg forward when Page came far out of the goal.

Petaluma had the last best chance to score with three minutes left in the second overtime. Rabbitt’s long ball wound up at the feet of Kois, who flicked a pass to Drake Albee, who had a clear look at the goal. But the Greyhounds’ goalie made a diving save, securing a tie game and prolonging the Trojans’ frustrating week.