COLLEGE SOCCER: Pirate men stave off comeback

PORT ANGELES — With four goals already in the back of the Everett net inside of the first 35 minutes, the Peninsula College men’s soccer team suffered a letdown, but not a full-fledged breakdown, hanging on for a 4-3 win Wednesday night at Wally Sigmar Field.

“Tired,” Pirates coach Jake Hughes said when asked how he felt after witnessing two different halves from his side.

“We played a really good first half and defensively I thought we were really strong defending from the front, we forced a lot of issues and those led to some really special moments for our key attacking players.”

“But we got complacent and comfortable with the lead and we allowed Everett to get back into the game and they accepted the invitation.”

Peninsula opened up its barrage early, scoring within the first minute.

A Noe Garfias pass from midfield found Nil Grau on the right side and he sent a right-to-left shot across the goal mouth and in for a 1-0 lead.

Koya Kimura started the chain of events leading to Peninsula’s second score, making a good pass up to Grau. Grau sprinted to the end line and sent a pass from right-to-left across the goal box and right to teammate Ezrah Ochoa for a tap-in goal in the 22nd minute.

Grau added another assist in the 33rd, gathering the ball with his back to the goal at the 18-yard box and sending a bicycle kick pass over his head to Konrad Mueller for a one-touch goal.

Grau scored less than a minute later when Peninsula College stole the ball after the restart for a 4-0 lead.

Everett’s Cristiano Whitaker clawed one back, heading in a goal in the 39th minute off a corner kick for a 4-1 halftime lead.

Whitaker found the net twice more as the Pirates struggled to clear the ball after set pieces in the 75th and 78th minutes to put the squeeze on Peninsula.

“We made some changes midway through the second half and those changes didn’t work,” Hughes said. “That’s on us as coaches and the coaching staff will make sure we are defending set pieces a little bit better.

“We showed some great resilience, in some of those key moments we were able to dig deep. So I’m happy with the result and the three points, but there’s lots of things to work on.

Everybody in the North Division is so good there’s not many opportunities to take your eye off the ball. If you do that you’ll get punished. We took our eye off the ball here.”

Peninsula (3-0-0, 6-0-0) hosts Whatcom at 2:15 p.m. Saturday.

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Sports reporter/columnist Michael Carman can be contacted at sports@peninsuladailynews.com.