ORANGE >> The Villa Park girls soccer team scored two second-half goals to earn a 3-2, come-from-behind victory over Newport Harbor in a CIF-SS Division 1 quarterfinal Saturday at El Modena High School.
The Spartans (19-3-2), who are the No. 4 seed, will play on the road against No.1 seed Santiago of Corona on Wednesday.
Rylee Lewis scored off a pass from Samantha Behnke to give the Spartans a 1-0 lead five minutes into the contest.
Antonello Russo scored for the Sailors (14-10-4) on a penalty kick five minutes later to tie the score.
Russo scored again on a breakaway in the 12th minute to give the Sailors a 2-1 lead.
The lead held up through most of the second half.
But the Spartans controlled most of the action in the half, mostly by playing keep away with dribbling and short passes on the Sailors’ side of the field.
The effort paid off for Villa Park when Rylie Whitaker got an open look and kicked a line drive from right to left into the net to tie the score in the 24th minute of the half.
Villa Park continued to maintain possession for several minutes after the tying goal as it looked for another scoring opportunity.
That came when Kaylen Jenkins took a shot that was stopped by a Sailors defender, but Jessica Ramirez controlled the rebound and kicked the ball into the net for what wound up being the winning goal.
“I knew I had to step up to score a goal,” Ramirez said. “It was a team effort. We all worked hard in the second half.”
Ramirez had scored an apparent goal in the first half, but it was nullified when the Spartans were called for offsides.
“That’s the team that we are trying to be and today they really pushed through,” Villa Park coach Breanna Carrillo said of her team’s second-half effort. “They knew that we had to push a little bit more to win. They finished their chances.”
Newport Harbor had an excellent chance to tie the score when it was awarded a penalty kick in the final minute.
Russo took the shot again and attempted to kick the ball over the head of Villa Park goalkeeper Mikayla Kendall. But the kick sailed too high and went over the net and the Spartans hung on for the victory.
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“Villa Park has been a top team for a while and I think we’ve been kind of looming in the shadows,” Newport Harbor coach Justin Schroeder said. “I think this game has more people thinking about Newport Harbor soccer for next year.”