Larkin forges tie with Batavia
The downpour of rain at Elgin’s Memorial Field wouldn’t stop the Larkin Royals’ boys soccer team on Tuesday, and neither could the short-handed Batavia Bulldogs.
The two teams would end up in a 3-3 Upstate Eight Conference River Division tie thanks to Larkin’s Jose Hurtado, who scored the game-tying goal with just 19 seconds left. It was a huge lift for the Royals (10-3-3, 1-0-2) to come away with the tie against another elite team.
“We also consider ourselves one of the best teams in the state,” said Larkin head coach Ken Hall. “It got dysfunctional a couple of times, but it’s the competitive level that got us the tie tonight because we refused to quit and got that goal in the last minute.”
Batavia’s John Barnes put the Bulldogs (11-1-2) on the board with 7:29 left in the first half, but Larkin would answer four minutes later with a goal by Tony Hernandez. Both teams continued the offensive rush as the rain continued to fall, with Batavia and Larkin each notching another goal before the half came to a close.
Batavia’s late first-half goal was put in by Eduardo Cuautle with 2:15 left on the clock, and Roberto Torres tied the game back up at 2-2 with 30 seconds left.
Nine minutes into the second half, Batavia’s Cody Witkowski gave the Bulldogs a 3-2 lead, a lead that they would hold onto for almost the entire half; but a red card issued to Anthony Torres would leave the Bulldogs short-handed and vulnerable to Hurtado’s last-minute goal.
“We knew it was our last chance to score,” Hurtado said. “It was the last play of the game, so we all went up and I think we got what we deserved. We pushed through the whole game. We were down on the board the whole time, but we never gave up.”
Batavia head coach Mark Gianfrancesco was not pleased with the heartbreaking outcome for his team.
“With a man down I thought those guys played masterfully,” said Gianfrancesco. “It’s sad that with 25 seconds left we were not paying attention to detail and following our marks through. We deserved to win that match.”