The Moorpark College men’s soccer team capitalized on a late surge to break their tie with the Irvine Valley College Lasers, pulling out a 3-1 victory.

In the first half, the Raiders dominated the ball, seemingly living on the opponent’s side of the field. Fernando Zandarin capitalized on the Raiders command of the ball by hitting a long distance goal with multiple defenders in his face, putting the Raiders up 1-0.

However, missed opportunities would begin to plague the Raiders after the score. Moorpark would see two corner kicks produce no tangible results and two shots at the goal that were missed by inches. Though they were missing great chances to strengthen their lead, the Raiders ability to be faster to the ball and win headers allowed them to deny the Lasers the ball for the majority of the game.

The missed opportunities from the first half began to hurt them again in the second. The Raiders missed two more corner kicks, and two shots; one of which was nearly inside the goal, but an Irvine player kicked it out at the last moment. These missed opportunities kept the Lasers close. This would prove to be costly as the Lasers would pick up the tempo and became more aggressive with the ball. Irvine scored in the middle of the second half, knotting up the score at 1-1.

With time winding down in the second, a tie seemed almost certain. However, team captain Luis Guitierrez took the ball in a one-on-one situation, made a series of moves, and scored the go-ahead goal with four minutes remaining.

Guitierrez knew exactly what he needed to do to get his team on top.

“Take him, fake him,” he said. “Put it right on top of the goal.”

The Raiders got an insurance goal from Kevin Staley towards the end on a great assist, putting the game away at 3-1.

At times, the game seemed to get away from the Raiders, but head coach Sean Roche believed they controlled most of the game and became more offensive minded towards the end.

“[I] thought that we had a large portion of the game,” he said. “[We] switched to a scoring mentality.”

Moorpark College looks to build on the momentum from this win when they host Cypress College Tuesday Sept. 15.