San Clemente's Boys Win, 2-0, Advance to Southern California Regional Finals

The San Clemente boys soccer team continued its unbeaten postseason dance Thursday afternoon at Thalassa Stadium, where the Tritons turned in an uneven performance and still came away with a 2-0 shutout of Golden Valley of Bakersfield in the Division I semifinals of the CIF Southern California Regional Championships. 

After turning in a sluggish first-half effort that only netted four shots, and only two on-frame, the Tritons' Steve Palacios provided the spark his team was looking for in the 11th minute of the second half. 

Palacios, a senior forward, started the play at midfield, where he dished off to Fabian Caudillo, then took off on a give-and-go and received Caudillo's through at the 20-yard line. Golden Valley keeper Adrian Torres raced out of the box to disrupt the play, but was too late as Palacios slipped a far-post roller past his diving fingertips and into the net.

"We've been playing together for a while," Palacios said of the chemistry between himself and Caudillo. "I already know what he's looking at, and he knows me well."

Palacios provided three of San Clemente's first-half attempts, and came up short on two consecutive breakaways in the second half before finally connecting on the goal.

Then, as Palacios blew a post-score kiss to the crowd, Thalassa Stadium came alive for the first time.

The Tritons finished with seven shots in the second half, one fewer than the Bulldogs, who only managed two shots in the first. San Clemente keeper Dylan Digiacomo was active in the final 40 minutes, coming up with five saves to finish with seven on the afternoon.

"Yeah, I don't know," Palacios responded when asked about San Clemente's slow start. "I don't know if the guys were not hungry anymore or something, but, you know, I want my name up there. I want to win it all."

Kevin Gould's penalty kick winner put the game on ice with just under 13 minutes left to play after Golden Valley was called for a handball inside their defensive goal box.

The goal was Gould's second in as many contests, both shutouts for the suddenly stingy Tritons, who failed to record a clean sheet throughout the CIF Southern Section playoffs on their way to the Division 1 title.

"Our defense is doing a good job; we're playing good team defense," San Clemente coach Michael Pronier said. "Steve did a couple of things in the first half, but outside of that, we weren't moving very quickly. We played a little bit more inspired in the second half and picked up the energy of the attack."

Second-seeded San Clemente is currently fighting a battle of attrition, with numerous injuries and a lingering team-wide chest cold taking their tolls. The news got worse Thursday, when sophomore midfielder Oscar Vasquez suffered a deep laceration to his leg caused by a collision with a Golden Valley defender that ended up well out of bounds.

"He's an awesome kid; all of our kids love him," Pronier said of Vasquez. "It's disappointing that we can't get through this without something like that happening, but he's a competitor and he'll be back."

With the victory, San Clemente now moves on to the championship game, which will be held Saturday at 6 p.m. at Warren High in Downey. The Tritons (19-6-6) will face top-seeded Buchanan (22-2-3; Central Section), a 1-0 winner over fourth-seeded Rancho Bernardo (18-6-1; San Diego Section) in Thursday's other semifinal.

Sixth-seeded Golden Valley, from Bakersfield and the Central Section, finished its season at 23-5-2.