Soccer team aiming for second straight league title

The Cascade Kodiak boys’ soccer team took some major steps toward another Caribou Trail League championship with wins last week against Okanogan and Cashmere. Cascade is 5-1 in league play, while Chelan is 4-1.
Chelan played at Cashmere (3-2) on April 24. Results were unavailable before press time. That game will go far in deciding the eventual league champ. Cashmere beat Chelan earlier in the season. Cascade’s final game of the regular season is at Chelan, which gave the Kodiaks their only league loss.
On April 19, Cascade played earned a hard fought, emotional game victory at Cashmere. Raul Mata took advantage of a defensive breakdown just three minutes into game for the opening score.
It remained 1-0 at half.
At 42 minutes, Efren Guerrero slipped by the defender for another goal to put Cascade up 2-0. At 62 minutes, former Kodiak Brian Sanchez was red carded for a hard foul on Cascade’s leading scorer, Arturo Avila. Emotions were running high as the two teams had to be separated.
Mata took the free kick and nailed a beautiful shot into the upper corner to put the Kodiaks up 3-0. At 75 minutes, Guerrero scored on a breakaway. The Kodiaks won 4-0.
“It was really important because now we’ve beaten them twice. If we can go through the season without another loss, then we’ll win the league and it will be much easier to make state. Only two teams from 1A and 2B that will make state,” said Cascade Head Coach Pete Spiegel. “It could be us and Cashmere or Brewster or whoever. It was a really important win. I thought we played hard. I told the guys, if we are first to the ball, we are going to win games. We did that against Okanogan and again today.”
Spiegel was pleased his players kept their heads in the game despite all the emotion, fouls, yellow cards and red cards.
“It was unfortunate we had that incident. Brian used to play with us. He’s one of my favorite players of all time. We’ll talk about that, keeping our cool and playing classy. That was disappointing. We didn’t deserve some of those yellow cards. I was glad we kept our cool for the most part,” Spiegel said.
On April 17, Cascade hosted Okanogan, winning 4-1. The Kodiaks played Okanogan again last Saturday, which Cascade won 2-1.
Cascade played at 2B Mason on April 23. Results were not available before press time. On Thursday, they play at Omak. The Kodiaks finish the regular season at Chelan on May 1, a game that could decide the league title.
Ian Dunn can be reached at 548-5286 or editor@leavenworthecho.com.