PLACENTIA — The game between Los Alamitos and El Dorado in the opening round of the CIF-SS Division 1 girls soccer playoffs appeared to be headed to overtime.
But then in the 78th minute, El Dorado’s Jialynn Davenport scored to give the Golden Hawks a 1-0 victory.
El Dorado (10-6-5) will play host to Westlake in a second-round contest Saturday at El Dorado High School. The Warriors defeated Fairmont Prep, 3-2, in the opening round.
Davenport scored by beating a defender in a race up field towards the goal.
The junior took possession and made the kick past the goalkeeper, who was coming toward Davenport attempting to cut down the angle.
The play was nearly identical to a play minutes earlier, with Davenport beating a defender to the ball and making a kick from the same wide angle.
But that attempt was stopped by the keeper.
And minutes before that, Davenport beat the defender to the ball and made a cross pass into the box, but there was no teammate in position to take the pass.
“I kind of just went for it,” Davenport said of shot she missed. “I feel like that’s why I missed it. So, the second one, I was just calmed myself before I shot the ball and I just found a spot and I just took it.”
The Griffins (7-14-3) were the more dominant team in the first half with most of the action taking place on the El Dorado side of the field.
In the second half, both teams were creating scoring chances, but both defenses did a good job of disrupting those chances.
“It was like we were playing ourselves tonight,” El Dorado coach Kyle Thomas said. “It was just a mirror image of what we do. which is defend really well and get a couple opportunities. I felt like they were the same. What a talented team we played against tonight.”
The Hawks are making their 13th consecutive appearance in the Southern Section playoffs and are back in Division 1 after playing in Division 2 the past two seasons.
“We did our job and they did their job,” Los Alamitos coach Pat Rossi said. “Hats off to them. Someone is going to define the game, and one play can. That final pass was lacking for us tonight.”