Skendi’s last-minute goal produces 2-2 tie

Albi Skendi went from the back to the front in the second half on Tuesday night and scored a dramatic goal in the 90th minute as SBCC rallied to tie L.A. Mission 2-2 in a WSC men's soccer match at La Playa Stadium.

Skendi, a 6-2 freshman from Albania, moved from defender to forward around the 60th minute. He hit a powerful close-range shot in the 79th minute that was saved by Luis Juan Joel. In the first minute of extra time, Richard Caine ran onto a ball on the left and made a little flip to Skendi, who one-timed it past the goalie with a left-footed blast.

"Out of the blue, coach told me to go up top in the second half," said Skendi, after notching the first goal of his college career. "I thought I might have been offsides on that last goal. I don't even know how I scored. I'm usually the worst one-time volleyer of the ball, I don't know how I did that.

"You can't play that well and go home with a loss. We should have won, to be fair. We had all the chances. That's the story of the season."

It was the third tie in the last four games for the fifth-place Vaqueros (6-8-4, 5-4-4).

Mission (9-3-5, 7-2-4) took a 1-0 lead in the 18th minute on a 24-yard free kick by Ericson Penate. The Eagles made it 2-0 in the 54th minute on a rebound goal by Antonio Robles.

The Vaqueros (6-8-4, 5-4-4) started their comeback in the 64th minute when Erik Winnberg's shot deflected in after a cross from Enrique Fernandez.

SBCC outshot the Eagles 17-12 and had a narrow 7-5 advantage in shots on goal. The Vaqueros had six of their seven shots on-goal in the second half.

"We had enough chances, we shouldn't have been down 2-0," said coach John Sisterson. "We had goal-scoring opportunities but we didn't seem to want to test the goalkeeper. We'd rather pass it around than shoot it. We told them to be positive and go forward.

"We found our rhythm in the second half, then we changed it up by throwing Albi up top. He played well and gave us some momentum. It was just a shame that we didn't have longer to play because we might have pulled it out."

The Vaqueros travel to Citrus for a rare morning start on Friday at 11 a.m.