Athlete of the Week: Mesa’s Garcia silences Estancia

A week ago, Alexsis Garcia capped off the best start in the Orange Coast League by the Costa Mesa High boys’ soccer team. Three matches, three wins.

Getting the third victory last week meant a lot to Garcia. He heard all the talk leading into the first of two Battle for the Bell rivalry contests with Estancia.

“Before the match, [the Eagles] were just saying a lot of stuff … about last year, about the past years, too, about [us not] making CIF,” Garcia said. “We just ignored them and shut them up on the field.”

Garcia quieted the Eagles with his right foot, propelling host Costa Mesa to a 4-1 upset of the then-No 5-ranked team in the CIF Southern Section Division 4 poll. The sophomore had a foot in each of the Mustangs’ goals, recording three assists and scoring a goal.

The win marked Costa Mesa’s first against Estancia at Jim Scott Stadium in three years, and it allowed the Mustangs to match their win total in league from the past two seasons.

Costa Mesa stayed in sole possession of first place, a far cry from last season. Garcia was around last season, when the team finished fifth in league for the fourth straight time, and it wasn’t what he envisioned in his first year in high school.

“Last year was just terrible,” said Garcia, whose team went 4-10-2 overall and 2-7-1 in league. “The chemistry as a team wasn’t good.”

Things have changed at Costa Mesa under Coach Chris Sullivan, who’s in his first season in charge. Garcia said Sullivan is a big reason why the Mustangs are 6-5-1 overall, a remarkable record considering they only won five times in the previous two seasons.

Other reasons Garcia gives as to why Costa Mesa is playing well are the players are closer and they’re held accountable.

This isn’t the first time Sullivan has coached the Mustangs, he served as an assistant under-then coach Alex Cordoba for three seasons, from 2008-09 to 2010-11. The two coaches helped turned a losing program into a playoff one, and then both left, Cordoba wanted to spend more time with family and Sullivan had a club coaching commitment.

Cordoba returned to Costa Mesa, this time as its director of boys’ and girls’ soccer programs, and he brought back Sullivan to lead the boys. Almost at the halfway point in league, the Mustangs look like a playoff team. They haven’t reached the postseason since 2010-11, when Cordoba and Sullivan guided the Mustangs.

“It was heartbreaking [to leave] because we left the program with a team that should’ve won league,” said Cordoba, referring to the 2011-12 season, which ended with the Mustangs placing fifth in league and missing the playoffs. “That coach left, then we got another one, a local, you know, Newport-Mesa club coach, and the commitment wasn’t there and then the players saw that, so they stopped being committed to the program [and] showing up to practice.”

Garcia and the Mustangs are all in now, and they all look forward to training together. Having around former Costa Mesa standout players like Franco Ramirez, Dong-Gi Shin and Jesus Estrada around the program has also elevated the morale.

Ramirez is an assistant on varsity, while Shin is the junior varsity coach and Estrada is a JV assistant. In 2010-11, Shin and Estrada played vital roles to the Mustangs’ third-place finish in league and their first playoff appearance in nine years.

“Having all those guys back with the program helps us deliver that message as far as what we’ve done in the past with the program and what we can do now,” Sullivan said.

The future looks bright for the Mustangs with a young and talented player like Garcia, even though they suffered their first setback in league on Wednesday, dropping to 3-1-0 and into second place.

Three-time defending league champion Godinez posted a 3-0 shutout of Costa Mesa at Jim Scott Stadium, extending its league unbeaten streak to 31 matches.

Garcia liked the way Costa Mesa played after it allowed three first-half goals. The Mustangs blanked the Grizzlies (9-1-4, 3-0-1 in league), ranked No. 12 in the state by TopDrawerSoccer.com, in the final 47 minutes.

Last year, Garcia said the score would’ve more lopsided. The Mustangs lost to Godinez by almost five goals per match a year ago.

His father, Pedro, has seen a dramatic shift in these Mustangs compared to the ones last season.

“My dad says we’ve improved a lot. He goes to like all my games,” said Garcia, adding that his dad introduced him at age 5 to soccer, along with his sister, Yaritza, a junior midfielder on the Costa Mesa girls’ soccer team. “Once we [got] down one goal, he said as a team we just gave up last year. But this year, we just kept fighting and we got better.

“The first three matches that we won, it wasn’t random. We worked for this. We worked as a team. We all put in the work.”

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Alexsis Garcia

Born: Aug. 14, 2000

Hometown: Newport Beach

Height: 5-foot-7

Weight: 150 pounds

Sport: Soccer

Year: Sophomore

Coach: Chris Sullivan

Favorite food: Pizza

Favorite movie: “Creed”

Favorite athletic moment: Helping the California South 2000 boys’ team win the U.S. Youth Soccer Olympic Development Program Region IV tournament last year in Phoenix, Ariz.

Week in review: Garcia produced three assists and a goal in the Mustangs’ 4-1 win against rival Estancia.