Photo credit: Luis Lemus

The Falcons were outplayed from the initial whistle to keep it simple.

Amy Cervantes, No. 15, who was not in the pool due to other commitments, the team was going into the game without a key component of their team contributed to the defeat.

After the tournament hosting Tigers of Riverside City College scored three quick goals, the Falcons finished the first quarter trailing with a score of five to one after Mia Carbajal, No.13, was able to put the Falcons on the board with an unassisted goal.

The Tigers were able to go on and score four more times in the second quarter, upping the score nine to one at the end of the second quarter.

In the third quarter, the Tigers put on two more goals when shortly thereafter the Falcons put on two straight goals. Marisela Olivas, No.7, scored first of the match while Carbajal scored her second of the game.

Shortly before the midway point of the fourth quarter, Carbajal was able to put herself and the team on the board one more time after the unassisted goal.

The Tigers were able to add two more unassisted goals to finish the match with a score of 14 to 1.

The Falcons certainly had their fair chances to score but were simply either unsuccessful in their attempts or overshot the goal post.

The Tigers had more overall better attempts to the back of the net and to move towards a match with the Vikings of Long Beach City College in the final.

This was the third time the two teams, Riverside City College and Cerritos College, faced each other and the third time that the Tigers ended up on the winning side.

Coach Sergio Macias, after the match, said, “It is not the result we wanted but we lost to a good team today.

“We had a great one yesterday so you give your hats off to both teams.”

Macias said, “We have six months starting off next week and just build confidence. We’ll have better skills and we’ll be in better shape. We can’t afford not to build off of the momentum. We can’t continue to not improve.

Coach Macias continued, “We haven’t made it this far in seven years so we want to establish the culture again and make this a standard.”

Carbajal said, “I am a bit disappointed but I feel we did a lot better than I expected but I feel like we gave it our all.”

Carbajal said, “Overall as a whole, yes, I am content. I’m a little disappointed in the results from the Long Beach game for the conference championship but I mean we haven’t reached that far since 2012 so I’m pretty content with that.”

When asked about areas Carbajal can see being improved she kept it short with the answer of “communication skills and staying focused.”

The loss wraps up the 2019 season for the Falcons with the first 20-game winning season

The team sets its sight for a successful start 2020 season starting Nov. 18.