Eldorado sets sights on boys soccer title in new Class 5A

The last time Eldorado’s boys soccer team played, it battled Bishop Gorman to a scoreless draw for most of the 2019 state championship match.

The Gaels finally scored in the final minutes to end the Sundevils’ title dreams with a 1-0 loss.

For two years, Eldorado has stewed over that loss, a situation made worse by losing the entire 2020 season because of COVID-19.

“We’re upset about missing last season because we wanted a chance to redeem ourselves,” said Eldorado coach David Ostler. “One of the strengths of our team through COVID is we have a good culture. Both my assistants played and graduated from Eldorado, so we tried to keep the team together, follow up on grades and do activities and events to keep our camaraderie.”

Eldorado will soon find out how well those efforts worked.

Ostler is confident the Sundevils have a core group that can lead them to success, starting up front with Adrian Figueroa-Corrales, a senior who was their leading goal-scorer with 20 in 2019; goalkeeper Jonathan Hernandez, center back Jorge Sandoval and center midfielder Rafael Lucio.

“I have a really good roster,” Ostler said. “But those guys right up the middle are going to be our strength.”

Gorman, which finished 25-0-1 in the 2019 state-title run, went 7-0-1 in the spring. But coach Kyle McKenna lost eight seniors and will have to rely on young players to fill key roles.

The Gaels have some firepower back from that team in forward Nick Lazarski and midfielder George Charles, and one of their top defenders in Braden Flannery.

“We still have a decent core in there,” McKenna said.

Eldorado and Gorman, along with 12 other teams, will need to adjust to a new Class 5A. Cimarron-Memorial coach Mark Bailey said the fact that most 5A teams haven’t played since 2019 is “kind of a Catch-22.”

Bailey said from talking with coaches, it seems as if every team is young. Even teams whose roster is loaded with seniors seem young because the last time they had their players, they were sophomores.

Instead of coaches thinking an opposing player has been around forever, they find themselves surprised that they’re already a senior or have graduated.

“It’s kind of a cool and uncool thing,” Bailey said. “If I was a mid-major team in Las Vegas, I would be a little excited about it. But as the coach of a team that expects to win (a certain number) of games every year, it’s a little frustrating.”

Bailey said he expects some teams — such as Eldorado, Bishop Gorman and 2018 state champion Las Vegas — to be strong as usual, but he thinks there will be surprise teams, too.

“Durango is always good, same with Chaparral and a few others,” Bailey said. “I have no idea what they have. At practice, some of my older guys are looking around, like, ‘I don’t know (if we’re good). But I have to remind them nobody has experience.”

]Contact Jason Orts at jorts@reviewjournal.com. Follow @SportsWithOrts on Twitter.