Boys’ Soccer: Sailors’ road woes continue

Fourteen matches into the Newport Harbor High boys’ soccer season, and the Sailors have yet to play at home.

The 14th contest took place on Wednesday, and at first, the Sailors looked forward to it. The match was supposed to be at home and it was a Sunset League opener against Edison.

The rain changed those plans, making the conditions at Newport Harbor unplayable. The venue changed, the Sailors played at Edison.

“They were discouraged,” Newport Harbor Coach Carlos Alcazar said of his players when they learned they were playing on the road again. “They’re like, ‘I thought it was going to be our first home game?’

“All of our games have been away because the stadium is supposed to be under construction. It’s tough for the guys.”

Playing Edison, which reached the semifinals of the CIF Southern Section Division 1 playoffs last season, on a wet and fast turf field didn’t do the Sailors any favors.

For most of the 80 minutes, except for a couple of minutes, it didn’t rain. While the Sailors avoided the rain, the Chargers still poured it on in the first half.

Edison produced all of its four goals by halftime and it went on shut out Newport Harbor, 4-0.

“We were asleep,” Alcazar said when asked what happened in the first 40 minutes. “We woke up the second half, but it was already too late. We got to work on encouraging one another. [Assistant] coach [Jose Vasquez] and I are trying to change the culture. There [are] no superstars on the team. You don’t show up to practice, you don’t play. You don’t suit up, you don’t play. That affects the team. That affects the [team] dynamic. [That] affects the team chemistry. Every time we’ve been having a different lineup because of that. So hopefully this first half is … a slap in the face.”

Alcazar, in his first season in charge of Newport Harbor, doesn’t want to use having to travel for every match as an excuse to the Sailors’ slow start. Nevertheless, the schedule has taken a toll on Newport Harbor, which dropped to 2-6-6 overall.

The Sailors fell behind right away against the Chargers (8-3-1, 1-0-0 in league), who share the No. 10 spot in the Division 1 poll. Edison earned three corner kicks in the first eight minutes, and the third led to a goal.

Jeff Wood took the corner kick, sending the ball to Sam Kemper, who headed it in to put Edison up in the eighth minute. Wood was in position to find the back of the net seven minutes later.

From midfield, Garen Balikcioglu sent a nice cross to a racing Wood on the right, and the striker got behind the defense. With goalkeeper Avery Ferguson coming out, Wood struck the ball over Ferguson, seeing it bounce toward the left corner of the net.

Then Dominic Bair recorded two goals in a two-minute span for Edison. The first came off a rebound in the box in the 30th minute. Two minutes later, with two defenders around him in the box, Bair scored again.

In the first 40 minutes, Edison outshot Newport Harbor, 14-1. The Sailors’ lone shot on goal came on a corner kick midway through the first half, on Tanner Cislaw’s corner kick. Keeper Brendan Fix easily made the save, one of two he made, after Thiago Costa replaced him in the 60th minute.

“I know they have a new coach, and [they’re] probably trying to figure out things,” Edison Coach Charlie Breneman said of the Sailors, who finished in last place in league last season. “In the first year, it’s always a difficult thing.

“The system they played, they could be successful, but I think the game was a little too fast for them tonight.”

The Sailors did slow down Edison in the second half. The defense and keeper Devon Patterson held the hosts scoreless in the final 40 minutes.

Alcazar liked the second-half play, and the play of midfielders Alex Avila and Marley Aragon.

“I don’t want to say that we’re a second-half team, but this is how they usually play,” Alcazar said. “And when they play like this, it can go either way. We obviously have the talent. The potential is there. We just need to take it more seriously and not give up.”

The Sailors’ next match is on Friday, against Fountain Valley. The site of the match wasn’t determined until Wednesday. Alcazar said the Barons’ field is in worse shape than the one at Newport Harbor, so the Sailors will finally get to play at home.

“We’ve had a tough time figuring out what fields to play at,” Alcazar said. “The city of Costa Mesa says that because we’re not in Costa Mesa we should look for Newport to, you know, lend us a field. We ask Newport, and they say, ‘What’s Costa Mesa giving you?’ It’s tough.”