After receiving a bye in the first round of the Southern California Regional Playoffs, the Cerritos College men's soccer team recorded a 1-0 win over visiting Santa Barbara City College on Saturday. The second round win for the #4-seeded Falcons (14-2-5) advances them to the third round, where they will host #5-seeded Norco College (15-2-5), who opened with a 1-0 win over Chaffey College. This will mark the second meeting of the year between Cerritos and the Mustangs, who posted a 1-0 win early in the season. Cerritos will be looking to snap a two-game losing streak against Norco.

In the win over the #13-seeded Vaqueros (12-7-3), the lone goal came on a penalty kick in the 28th minute. Sophomore Donovan Perez (South East HS) was tackled in the 18-yard box by Leo Rubio, and he converted his fifth penalty kick attempt this season, which was also his 13th goal of the season.

Cerritos put pressure on the Santa Barbara City defense early on, and had a clean shot at the goal, but Pedro Reyes (Connections Academy HS/Cal State Fullerton) saw his shot hit the left post in the 17th minute. Through the first 45 minutes, the Falcons took six shots, with three of them on goal.

Freshman goalkeeper Griffin Welch (Long Beach Poly HS) turned away both first half shots by SB City, which came off the foot of Kevin Zendejas. Welch, who posted his ninth shutout of the season, finished the day with three saves.

Although the Vaqueros appeared to work their way into the Falcons zone, they were turned away by some solid defense from the group that included Alberto Gomez (Los Alamitos HS), Joshua Chavez (Ambassador School of Global Leadership HS), Gustavo Arias (Fairmont Prep HS) and D'Alessandro Rivera (Mater Dei HS), among others.

With Santa Barbara looking to take some chances on offense in the final few minutes, Cerritos had several great chances to add to their lead. Erick Velasco (Norwalk HS) had the best chance, but was turned away at point blank range from a sliding Miles Keane, who made eight saves.

Photos courtesy of Oliver Brice