By BAKER ELLIS / Sports Editor

CHELSEA – The Pelham boys’ soccer team traveled the 20 minutes down U.S. 11 on March 8 to take on Chelsea in the first area matchup of the year for both teams. Chelsea brought a 5-3-2 record and a 6A No. 5 ranking into the contest while Pelham was 5-4-2 coming in and ranked No. 7 in 6A. Both teams compete in 6A Area 10, so this game was doubly important to both teams moving forward, as it had playoff implications. After a 90-minute scoreless stalemate, Pelham eventually beat Chelsea in a penalty kick shootout, 3-2.

“It’s hard to beat Chelsea over here,” Pelham head coach Patrick McDonald said after the game. “(It was a) Little bit of a sloppy game just from both sides. We had opportunities, they had opportunities, but classy at the end. Even though Chelsea lost, in losing they showed so much class. Even though there was a foul here or there, it never escalated, and that’s what you want to see.”

From the jump, Pelham dominated possession and looked to push the pace. The Panthers were without Jose Jimenez and Brian Herrera, both upperclassmen starters, and McDonald wanted to put one in the back of the net early.

“Going into the game, we were down a couple starters,” McDonald said. “So we went a little aggressive, very much an attacking style early on. I knew with our personnel situation we needed to put one in and be aggressive at first. We had opportunities, we just weren’t able to put it in the back of the net.”

The foursome of Olver Espinoza, Irvin Rodriguez, Braxton Jeffcoat and Edwuin Patricio in particular for Pelham stretched the defense early. The four combined for a number of neat and crisp combinations in the middle of the field that ended with a look at the Chelsea goal. While the Chelsea defense bent frequently, it did not break, and goalie Markus Frederick was on high alert for the majority of the first half as he maintained a clean goal.

While Pelham had a higher quantity of chances early, it was Chelsea who had the more quality chances. The only real offense the Hornets were able to create in the first half was off of the counterattack. In the 36^th minute, Nicholas Craddock fed a beautiful pass to Tyler Thomas on one such counter, and Thomas had maybe the best look of the first half, but pushed his shot just to the left of goal, and the teams went into the half tied at 0-0.

As the second half wore on, the game was played more in the middle of the field than in the Chelsea defensive third, but neither side could gain a leg up on the other. Pelham’s Yunior Tejada had two decent looks from 20 yards out late in the half, but sailed both over the crossbar. The best chance of regulation came with 62^nd minute, when Thomas once again found himself behind the Pelham defense, but Seth Torman, the Pelham keeper, got just enough of a piece of the ball to push it left of the goal, the same direction Thomas had misfired from in the first half, and the two teams were all square after 80 minutes at 0-0.

“I felt like we had better quality chances, they had more quantity chances,” Chelsea head coach Wilee Miller commented. “They had some good chances late and we did too. All we needed was to complete one of those. We’d loved to have possessed the ball better, but (we) still had some good looks.”

Because this was an area game, a winner had to be declared. Area opponents cannot tie, as regular season area games are the deciding factor to determine which two teams from each area advance to the playoffs. Overtime, and eventually penalty kicks, decide area games if regulation does not.

After two quick five-minute overtime periods where both teams looked to be playing not to lose as opposed to trying to win, the game headed to penalty kicks.

Lando Nichols shot first for Chelsea and hit, which was followed by a Tejada miss for Pelham, putting the Hornets up 1-0 after one round. Miles Sharp then followed for Chelsea, and went right down the middle, where Torman was waiting and gobbled up the shot. Rodriguez, just an eighth-grader, was next for Pelham and slammed his shot home to tie the score at 1-1 after two rounds.

Eli Alexander was up next for Chelsea, and chipped his shot off the top crossbar before it found the back of the net. Patricio followed suite and found the back of the net for Pelham, moving the score to 2-2 after three.

Next, Frederick, the Chelsea keeper, stepped to the line to take Chelsea’ fourth shot and missed. The decision to allow a keeper to take a penalty kick as opposed to a field player seemed to be an interesting one from the Chelsea coaching staff, but Miller explained his reasoning for the move.

“We were talking about it as the game got late,” Miller said. “Markus, believe it or not, probably takes more PK’s than anybody we have, being a goalie he thinks about that and practices more. He’s a senior, he’s a captain, and we felt like we had some guys we trusted. You got to give Pelham’s keeper a lot of credit.”

After Frederick’s miss, Jeffcoat pumped one in to the back of the net to give Pelham a 3-2 lead after four rounds. Thomas stepped to the line for Chelsea to take the Hornets’ final shot and extend the game, but sent the ball right down the middle where Torman was waiting, and Pelham got the win.

This was a big win for a Pelham team that lost 13 seniors off of last season’s Final Four team. The win pushed the Panthers to 6-4-2, but more importantly gave them a leg up in postseason positioning. Chelsea fell to 5-4-2 in one of the most excruciating ways possible, but is not dead in the water.

“We’re not eliminated, that’s the message going forward,” Miller said. “We’ve dug a hole now, and we’ve got to get out of it. We’ve left it all to be done in three games instead of four.”