Rumble in the Rainforest, tremors on the field

By Eric Trent

The 2015 Rumble in the Rainforest started off with a tremor, as Cale Rodriguez, in his Peninsula College coaching debut, led the Pirate men to a 2-1 victory over semi-pro team Olympic Force. Hours later, the Pirate women played Saint Martins University to a 1-1 stalemate. Immediately after, the Pirate men fell 2-1 at the hands of the Kitsap Pumas in the last game of the day for Peninsula College.

In the first game against Olympic Force, Peninsula got on the board first with a Victor Sanchez goal from 20 yards out, on the far post, with 16:35 left in the second half.

“I saw that I had space and I just decided to take the shot. I was surprised when it went in. I didn’t think it had enough power. I just saw it go over the goalkeeper and it curved in, so I was pretty happy, especially since it’s my last time playing at this field,” Sanchez said.

Three minutes later, Kassio Monteiro blasted one through the goal from five yards out to put Peninsula up 2-0 with 13:55 left in the game. “I tried to hit the ball to the second post and it went through. It felt really good because that was my last game as a Peninsula soccer player,” Monteiro said.

Olympic ended the scoring for the game on a goal with 5:13 left, giving the Pirates a 2-1 win. “For our first game, after three weeks of training, I think the guys were excited and came out and put in a good effort, so that’s always good to see,” Rodriguez said.

“Surely there are some things to clean up but that process will take some time. I’m overall pleased with how we came out, especially in the second half, put a little bit more of a stamp on the game and try to put it away. Hopefully we can build on that,” Rodriguez said.

Two hours later, the Peninsula women faced off against a Division II foe, Saint Martins University, ending in a 1-1 tie.

Saint Martins used a suffocating interior defense to keep Peninsula’s offense pushed back to their own side of the field
for much of the first half. Saint Martins got on the board first after Peninsula’s goalkeeper, Manaia Siania-Unutoa blocked a shot, prompting Saint Martins to kick the rebound back in the goal to go up 1-0 with 19:20 left in the first half.

Nine minutes later, with the Pirates in attack-mode, Saint Mary’s accidentally headed in a goal for Peninsula to notch the score up at 1-1, which would be the final goal of the game. Siania-Unutoa played spectacular, recording nine saves for the game, including multiple diving saves to fend off would be goals for Saint Martins.

For their last match of the day, the Pirate men fell behind semi-pro team, the Kitsap Pumas, 2-0 in the first half, and couldn’t catch up in the second half, taking a 2-1 loss.

Behind 2-0, with 5:04 left in the game, Pirate midfielder, Eddie Benito was fouled going for a score. Midfielder, Trevan Estrellado took the free kick and launched a curveball over the right side of the block to give Peninsula their only point of the game and end the scoring.

“I saw that the goalkeeper didn’t set the wall up properly. He could have moved it a little bit to the right. I’ve been practicing this shot since the beginning of the season,” Estrellado said.

“Any time you can play a good team in the spring, it’s only going to make you better. It gives you an opportunity to see where your guys are at, finish-wise, see where your guys are at in terms of the system of play you want to try to execute,” Rodriguez said.

“It’s a learning experience for sure, for our guys and myself. It’s only something that I think overall is going to make us better. I’d rather play a quality side, like Kitsap and Force, and get those good games in against good opponents in the spring versus give-me-games and not being challenged,” Rodriguez added.

“It’s surely something that I’d love to do again and look to build upon. You don’t find out who you are until you’re truly tested. We were definitely tested today,” Rodriguez said.