by Alan Hoskins, KCKCC
Kansas City Kansas Community College is one win away from the NJCAA Division I national soccer tournament thanks to the most dramatic and important win in Blue Devil history Thursday night.
Sophomore goalkeeper Youssef Gadelkerim’s diving deflection of the 11th shot of a shootout gave the Blue Devils an epic 8-7 win over Rose State College of Oklahoma in semifinal action at Topeka’s Hummer Field.
The win sends KCKCC into today’s championship game against Ranger (Texas) College at noon, a game that will be streamed live and available on video on the KJCCC website (www.kjccc.org). Ranger also had to go to a shootout to beat Barton County 5-3 after the two teams had battled to a 1-1 tie.
KCKCC and Rose State also fought to a 1-1 tie. Sophomore Guilherme Grave put the Blue Devils ahead 1-0 with a shot from the top of the box over the outstretched arms of goalkeeper Owen Wheeler at the 24:25 mark of the first half only to have Rose State get even on a penalty kick by Ala Ramadan at 39:51.
The shootout came after two scoreless 10-minute overtimes in which the Blue Devils had five shots on goal to only one for Rose State. In fact, KCKCC dominated most of the game, firing 19 shots on goal to only four for Rose State
The Blue Devils took command in the overtime, jumping to a 3-1 lead on goals by Ricardo Angelo, Gustavo Palmeiri and Giovanni Calderon but Grave had a shot hit the top of the crossbar and Frano Buhovac missed wide and the Raiders rallied to tie 3-3 and force sudden death.
Shooting first, Leonardo DaSilva put KCKCC ahead 4-3 but Christian Balderas pulled Rose State even before the Raiders missed their one chance for the win as both KCKCC’s Brajan Huyke and Rose State’s Julio Hernandez missed.
The Blue Devils were rocked solid the rest of the way as Pa Ousman Jobe, Mario Sandoval, Emmanuel Hernandez and Angelo pounded shots in to the back of the net. It was the second shootout goal for Angelo and proved to be the winner when Gadelkerim’s diving deflection of Ramadan’s bid for a third goal brought the entire Blue Devil squad swarming over the KCKCC goalkeeper.