By Michael Wojtychiw
Solorio’s boys soccer program is used to having success. The program won the 2018 city title, 2017 state title and as manager Adrian Calleros called it the “unofficial city championship” in the spring of 2021, so playing in big games is nothing new for the Sun Warrior program.
So when the team started off 2-2 this season, Calleros and his squad started hearing the questions on whether this was a down year or is this the year it struggles, etc.
It might be fair to say that those rumblings were quite premature, as Solorio has lost only once since August 27th’s shootout loss to Bloom at the Reavis tournament. That’s one loss in the last 15 games, including avenging that one loss to Washington with a 5-1 win in the city playoff quarterfinals Saturday.
That streak also includes Wednesday’s dramatic come-from-behind penalty-kick 1-1 (5-3 PKs) win over Taft in the city title game at Lane.
“The challenge during the summer was that we only had four seniors, so we were saying ‘We can win…if you guys are willing to lead,’” Calleros said. “If you guys are willing to lead, the younger guys are very talented and they’ll buy in and do what needs to be done, but you guys need to lead by example.”
“It started off a little rough. People were acting like the sky was falling but it was like ‘Ok, give us a little time, we have a good amount of talent and we’ll moild them.’
“They grew up. We asked them to play like men and they came out and answered the bell.”
One of those seniors who has really stepped up down the stretch has been senior Orlando Ojeda.
The forward scored four goals in Solorio’s semifinal win over North Grand and also scored the tying goal with just under seven minutes remaining in regulation, as well as the deciding goal in penalty kicks.
“In these type of games, we’ve been struggling but we’ve always been a second-half team,” Ojeda said. “I decided that these past few games, I’m going to show out for my last season and just put it all out there.
“I started out slow, didn’t want to lose our confidence down 1-0, but we picked our heads up.”
“He’s a senior who realizes this season is his last,” Calleros said. “The talent has always been there, it’s been the drive and the heart that’s really showing now.”
It was Taft, however, who dominated play, especially in the first half.
The Eagles scored on their first true scoring chance, a ball from Matthew Gruszka off of a corner kick less than 13 minutes into the match. Gruszka recently returned from a broken leg suffered earlier in the season.
Just moments later, a free kick for Taft was saved when a header was saved by the Solorio keeper and less than a couple minutes after, the Eagles thought they had their second goal when the ball looked like it went in after hitting the crossbar, but it was ruled not a goal.
“I thought we played really well in the first half,” Taft manager Jeffrey Lucco said. “We were really unlucky to not have a second goal there in the first half. I think they started worrying and we played to try not to lose instead of playing to win.
“But they’re good. I’m proud of the guys. I hate it, they hate it, but not everybody gets to play here. This was awesome. It was a great environment. These guys got to play in an environment they’ve never played in before, so hopefully that’s something they remember.”
For Taft, this marked the first city title appearance since an epic battle in 2016 with Lane, a game the Eagles lost in penalty kicks but came in as a heavy underdog after being relegated to the First Division that season due to the previous year’s results.
An upperclassman-heavy squad helped propel the Eagles to this point, a season that had the Eagles outscoring their opponents 45-11 coming into the title game.
“I think after we lost to Boylan and Barrington,” said Lucco, when talking about when he foresaw the team being able to make this run. “We were 3-2 at the time, but we felt we were better than both of them and they were both really good teams.”
“Even the guys, their belief was like ‘Wait a second, we might be good.’ They started to think that they might actually be good and then it slowly started to fall together for us. They just started clicking and everyone is happier when they’re winning.”
After struggling to get much offensive traction in the first half, the Sun Warriors came out looking for the equalizer right away.
Midway through the second half, the Sun Warriors had their best chances to that point, including a couple point blank saves that Taft keeper Sebastian Rodriguez laid out to save and keep his squad in front.
A scoreless two five-minute overtime periods sent the match to penalty kicks, where the Sun Warriors made an interesting move: they switched goalies from David Salgado to Angel Garcia.
“You know kids,” Calleros said. “They play and practice PKs at practice every day and there are just some players who are more comfortable with penalty kicks.”
Both teams converted on their first three penalties, as Ivan Lopez, Adrian Munoz and Yamir Gallegos converted for Solorio, while Matej Sokola, Hansel Calix and Gabriel Vidaurre scored for Taft.
The Sun Warriors’ fourth shooter, Milton Valenzuela, knocked in his attempt, before Garcia made the save of the day, thwarting Jakub Kieras’ attempt, setting up Ojeda’s heroics.
The senior walked up to the penalty area and sent his teammates and Solorio fans happy with his goal.
“There was definitely some pressure, but I don’t pay attention to it, I do what I have to do,” Ojeda said. “I tend to always go to my left side, hard pocket. I knew if I shot it as hard as I can, the goalie wasn’t going to stop it.”
Both teams now prepare for the state playoffs, where the Sun Warriors earned the second seed in the Class 2A St. Laurence Sectional and face Kennedy in a Noble/Mansueto Regional semifinal Tuesday. The Eagles, on the other hand, are the fifth seed in the Class 3A Glenbrook South Sectional and face off with St. Patrick on Tuesday. A win there would most likely set the Eagles up with the regional hosts, Niles North, for the regional title.
“These are the type of games a young team needs when going into the state playoffs,” the Solorio manager said.
“We believe that we’re good enough to win our sectional,” Lucco said. “We have to get these guys back on the page where ‘Yes we lost, but there are bigger goals.’”
