Rodriguez leads Paloma Valley lacrosse team to victory
Gizelle Rodriguez (5) and Lily Trejo (20) celebrate a goal in Tuesday's game. (Photo by Rick Rowell) By Paige Mendez, Correspondent ...
By Paige Mendez, Correspondent
Paloma Valley’s girls lacrosse team got its third league win of the season in a 10-5 victory over Hemet at home Tuesday night.
Three minutes into the game, Hemet put pressure on the Wildcats with a shot that was blocked by goalie Bella Pacitto. But just over a minute later, the Bulldogs had the lead with one goal.
Paloma didn’t have an answer for the next three minutes, but coach Julie Blied said that’s how her team’s games have gone for much of the season.
“It takes them a minute to realize how good they are,” said Blied. “I feel like our team plays to the level of our opponent, but it’s just a mindset thing right now.”
After that slow start, Blied called a timeout and that’s when she said the momentum changed.
Abi Gomez took the ball downfield after a Bulldog turnover, then got it to Lily Trejo, who put up the Wildcats’ first point just under the 17-minute mark of the first half.
The following 10 minutes included five unanswered goals from Gizelle Rodríguez, who Blied said was a big difference maker in the game.
“Giselle was huge for us,” Blied said. “She can score at will; she can just turn it on and score, and that’s huge for us.”
Hemet scored two more goals in the last two minutes of the first half, making the score at halftime 6-3 for Paloma Valley.
Rodriguez came in hot for the second half with a goal in the first two minutes of play. Then Abi Gomez scored on an assist from Gianna Bailey to put them at a cushioned score of 8-3 with 20 minutes to go in their game.
But Rodriguez wasn’t finished until she scored just one more goal for the team on an assist from Trejo to put them up 9-3 and set a school record for most goals—seven—scored by a single player. However, according to Rodriguez, that wasn’t on her mind in the game.
“I don’t play to set records,” Rodriguez said. “I just love the game so I go out there and put all my love on the field.”
Hemet had four key chances to score in the test of the game and two went through for them, while the other two were blocked by goalies Pacitto and Peyten Peterson.
Thanks to Paloma’s cushion made early on by and one extra goal scored by Gomez with a minute and a half to go, Paloma took the win 10-5.
The team’s next matchup will be at Poly after spring break on April 18.
Blied and her team plan to win-out from this point forward, but, more than that, they hope to make a name for girls lacrosse in the community.
“We’re a growing program,” Blied said. “We really want to develop lacrosse here.”
“I want people to know how hard we’ve worked to be here,” Rodriguez said of their 4-6 record, compared to last season’s single win. “I want people to know how far we’ve come.”
