Lely Advances to Regional Final

Every soccer game develops its own flow. The Thursday, February 14 regional semifinal at Trojan Stadium between number two seed Lely and number three seed Wauchula Hardee was an intense, physical, and scoreless game until Lely scored the game’s only goal on a penalty kick early in the second half. The 1-0 final was in sharp contrast to last week’s 8-1 win over Cypress Lake in the regional quarterfinal. The win sets up a much anticipated regional final at number one seed Naples High School on Tuesday, February 17.

"We were awarded the penalty kick,” said Robbie Schank, Lely coach of the winning goal against Hardee (14-3-2). “Our freshman, Danny Otero, has been practicing that shot all along. He nailed it just like he does in practice. That's why we chose him. He really stepped up."

Otero's penalty kick came after the Hardee goalie plowed into Lely’s Mauro Martinez inside the penalty box, just outside the goal. Otero stepped up and calmly drilled the 12-yard penalty kick past the Hardee goalie.

The goal seemed to spark Lely, who started slowly offensively. Yet the Trojans could not push across an insurance goal.

"We came out flat,” Schank said. "We did not have our best game tonight. Hardy didn't really present too much of a threat offensively, so we were trying to push more numbers forward to see if we could actually put away the game with another goal. But it just never happened. We had a couple opportunities. Tonight it wouldn't go in. That's the difference. Against Cypress Lake, every shot went in. This time nothing went in. Our whole chemistry was off tonight.”

But the bottom line is the Trojans were able to hang on to win and advance.

“Good teams find ways to win,” Schank said, "and we got the job done. We're moving on to the regional finals, that's all I know. I'm very blessed to have this opportunity with this young team with only two starting seniors. The sky's the limit for this group. And maybe we're just saving our best game for Naples. Maybe this will humble the guys to know that they've gotta work harder, and they've gotta prepare better mentally before they step on the field.”

Lely travels to Naples on Tuesday, February 17, for the regional championship. The Eagles host because they are the top seed in the region. Ironically, Lely (16-3-4) has beaten Naples (13-6) both times the teams played this season. In the regular season, they beat Naples, 3-0, then knocked them off again, 3-2, in the district final in January. Both games were played on Naples’ home field. Tuesday's regional final starts at 7:00 PM.