Gardena High’s boys’ soccer team saw its season come to an end after being shut out by KingDrew Medical Magnet 2-0 in the CIF-Los Angeles City Section Division III Championship Game last Saturday at L.A. Valley College in Van Nuys. The Panthers came into the contest riding high in reaching the finals for the second time in three seasons. Two years ago, Gardena made the CIF-L.A. City Section Division IV final but fell short of Garfield High 3-2. Gardena reached this year’s Division III final by blanking Chatsworth 2-0 in the semifinal on Feb. 23 at Gardena. The Panthers, who ended their season at 17-4-4, found the sound defense of the Golden Eagles too much to get through. Gardena managed to outshoot King-Drew 9-7 but never could get through Golden Eagle junior goalkeeper Ethen Ramirez. King-Drew used an effective spread out defense and stacked some of their players around the goal making things too complicated for Gardena shooters to even have much of a chance to get any of their shots in the net. The Panthers managed to have a few good shots but were mostly wide right or good saves by Ramirez and the rest of the Golden Eagle defense would turn back any threats. The match started out as a very good defensive battle but things began to unravel shortly after Gardena sophomore goalkeeper Salvador Tojil was knocked down with about 20 minutes left in the first half. Tojil managed to get up and even make a few saves but King-Drew (15-3-3) got on the scoreboard about three minutes later when junior midfielder Alexander Hernandez scored his first of two goals from the left corner, slipping past Tojil and into the net. The score remained 1-0 until the 54th minute when Gardena’s Arturo Benigno was called for an illegal tackle on Hernandez, leading him to a penalty kick. Hernandez successfully kicked the ball past Tojil that gave the Eagles a two-goal lead. The Panthers had a few threats to get on to the scoreboard but were denied as KingDrew, that was one time in the Marine League with Gardena from a few years ago and is today in the Coliseum League where it finished second behind champion Locke, was able to win the championship and advance to this week’s CIF-Southern California Championship playoffs, while Gardena ended its attempt to get into it for the first time in the program’s history. “We had some bad breaks,” Gardena head coach Elmer Membreno said. “Some of the official calls didn’t go our way.” King-Drew went on to the Southern California playoffs where it opened as the No. 8 seed in Division IV. The Eagles got the task at playing at top seed Montclair, the CIF-Southern Section Division IV champion. Montclair defeated Wiseburn-Da Vinci 3-0 for the championship Saturday at El Segundo High. Three days earlier, the Panthers, who were fifth seed in the playoffs, were able to shut down a tough Chatsworth team, seeded eighth. Senior forward-striker Eynar Romero scored both goals for Gardena and both of Romero’s scores were assisted from sophomore midfielder-striker Angel Munieve. The match was scoreless until Romero’s two second half goals. Tojil recorded the shutout as he had 12 saves. The match went quick lasting only about 90 minutes. After winning the CIF-L.A. City Division V crown two years ago and Division IV title last season, both over Sun Valley Prep, the Lady Panthers, who were the top seed in Division IV, were eliminated in the semifinals with a 3-2 extra-innings home loss to South L.A. Jefferson on Feb. 23.
