There was a noticeable calm before the storm Friday night at Kino North Stadium. FC Tucson surrendered an early goal, trailed at home … and then scored five straight goals to defeat FC Boulder U23 5-1.
In the process, the Men in Black (4-2-1) continued their recent dominance over Boulder. The teams met May 26 at Prentup Field in Boulder, with FC Tucson securing a 5-0 victory to close out a three-week road trip.
Boulder (0-2-1) put the first goal on the board during Friday’s matchup after a 12th-minute communication mixup between the FC Tucson midfielders and defenders led to a golden opportunity.
FC Tucson attempted to play the ball back to goalkeeper Luis Barraza, but a bad ball intended for defender Gio Vazquez was intercepted by FC Boulder midfielder Kino Ryosuke.
After a turn toward the goal from Ryosuke, FC Boulder had a two-on-one break with just Barraza to beat. Ryosuke laid off the ball for forward Leigh Veldam, who slotted in the opening goal into the bottom right corner of the net for the early 1-0 lead.
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“I just feel like we have one of these a games, and it consistently gets punished,” FC Tucson coach Jon Pearlman said. “We’re just not getting away with it. Of the goals we’ve given up, they’re all moments like that … and we just need to avoid these mental lapses.”
It didn’t take long for the home team to respond.
FC Tucson scored three goals in five minutes, securing the lead.
Midfielder Moshe Perez scored the first of three first-half goals after receiving a pass inside the box from forward Wedner Delmonte in the 22nd minute. Perez made a quick turn and put in the 1-1 equalizer past the outstretched arms of FC Boulder goalkeeper Jorge Becerra.
FC Tucson kept the pressure on just three minutes later when forward Daniel Kurtzen fooled Becerra on a looping curled shot to the back post off his left foot for the go-ahead 2-1 goal in the 25th minute of play.
Perez added his second goal two minutes later on a free kick from just outside the penalty box. Like that, FC Tucson led 3-1.
The two goals from Perez on Friday night gave the midfielder five goals over the last two games, both of which happened to be against FC Boulder. Add in five goals over the past five games from Krutzen, and FC Tucson has a pair of legitimate scorers.
“All the guys are being positive about it and are happy we’re scoring,” Perez said. “I guess they love the both of us. It’s been fun playing with those guys, scoring goals and winning games.”
Play settled down considerably from that point on, with FC Tucson electing to play the possession game for the remainder of the half, leading to a 3-1 halftime lead.
Boulder opened up the second half with a notable sense of urgency, leading to several shots on goal over the first 15 minutes of the half.
FC Tucson withstood that early onslaught before Krutzen scored the team’s fourth goal in the 77th minute. Afonso Pinheiro scored the team’s fifth and final goal of the game in the 88th minute.
Despite the easy win, Pearlman said he wants to see more consistency from his squad. The team won’t play again until June 17.
“We’re definitely pleased with the result, but for us the performance is still a little erratic for what we’d like to see,” Pearlman said. “But, you can see what the team can do in spurts. … They can score three goals.”
