Rio Hondo Shaping Into Top Team In SCC Women's Soccer
Rio Hondo College won the South Coast Conference women's soccer title in 2019. After a cancelled season in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Roadrunners have simply taken up where they left off as the conference's frontrunner as they begin the 2021 campaign.
Going into games on Sept. 17, Rio Hondo was undefeated at 4-0, including knocking off at the time state #1-ranked Ventura College, 3-0, on Sept. 14.
In this week's sports information director's State Top 20 poll, Rio Hondo is now a SCC-best #6 ranked. RHC has outscored their four opponents, 14-2. Alexis Macias, who scored hat tricks in both of the team's first two victories over Golden West and Clovis, leads the SCC in scoring with eight goals and four assists for 20 points. Rio Hondo also is led by the 2019 SCC Defensive Player of the Year in defender Brianna Valdez. Alice Hernandez, an All-SCC First Team midfielder is another returning player.
Mt. San Antonio (4-2) is rated #16 in this week's state poll. The Mounties have losses to now #7 Ventura and #18 San Diego Mesa, but won its inaugural mini Mt. SAC Women's Nike/Azteca Tournament, blowing out Norco, 6-0, in the title match. Kaylee Gutierrez has four goals to lead the Mounties' offense thus far.
At a #17 ranking, Long Beach CC is off to a 2-1-2 start, including a pair of 0-0 ties v. Fullerton and Golden West. In the team's season opener, the Vikings walloped San Diego Miramar, 13-0, as Allison Rose Veloz, a returning '19 All-SCC First Team forward, netted six goals. She has nine goals to lead the SCC. Even the though team has allowed just one goal in its five games, it resulted in the team's lone loss, 1-0 v. #4-ranked Saddleback.
Compton has begun the year well with a 2-0-1 record. The Tartars beat Irvine Valley, 2-1, on Sept. 14. Denise Gonzalez scored goals in each of Compton's first two games.
Los Angeles Harbor is 2-3-2 including a 1-0 win over LA Valley this week. Pasadena CC (1-5) has been blanked in all five of its losses, yet have an 8-0 win over Victor Valley to its credit. Juanita Diaz scored the hat trick in that game.
Los Angeles City College, a brand new program, is 0-2-1, but has played very well v. all three opponents. The Cubs lost in the last minute to College of the Desert in their inaugural game, lost to Palomar just 1-0, and then tied Norco, 2-2. Midfielder Stephanie Cardenas has been one of their top players with a goal and an assist.
Three other teams are still looking for their first victory or tie of 2021--Cerritos (0-5), El Camino (0-3) and East Los Angeles (0-4). Cerritos goalie Anahi De Leon has made a conference high 51 saves this season, including 15 in a loss to City College of San Francisco.
This season, the conference is crowning two division champions based on a 9-game schedule where all ten SCC teams play each other once. The five teams in the North are Rio Hondo, Pasadena, ELAC, LA City, and Mt. SAC while the South is comprised of Long Beach, Cerritos, El Camino, Compton and LA Harbor. While the division champions will be decided on how many team points (three points for a win, one point for a tie) they make over nine games, their postseason qualifying will be based on a regular-season ending SCC Tournament which will decide an automatic qualifier for the team that wins and then the next automatic qualifier the highest team that places in the tourney from the other division.
*Editor's Note--Breaking Update--Cerritos records a 1-0 victory v. Irvine Valley today for the team's first win.