Randee Romero is an ASU Cronkite School of Journalism student assigned to cover Red Mountain High School for AZPreps365.com

Red Mountain boys soccer defeated Desert Vista, 3-2,Tuesday night, in an important match as both teams continue to fight for spots in the state tournament. 

The intensity of the game presented itself early on. Desert Vista (6-3) took an early lead with a goal in the eighth minute. The Mountain Lions (6-4-1) deflected a corner kick from the Thunder that the Thunder was able to tame and send to the back of the goal. 

The Mountain Lions were quick to respond with a goal only two minutes later. Junior midfielder Anthony Osorio beat the Thunder defense in a foot race towards the goal. Osorio gained enough space to send a shot into the bottom right corner and tie the game at 1-1 in the 10th minute. 

“After we got the first one it allowed us to expose what their weaknesses were and update the game plan from there,” Red Mountain coach Mike Miller said. Miller made adjustments to stretch the Mountain Lions across the field, and allow his players to create more scoring opportunities from out wide. 

Red Mountain was able to pull ahead in the 21st minute. In a battle downfield Luke Hanes managed to power through the Desert Vista defense while maintaining enough control of the ball to send an easy pass across the top of the box to junior Malachi Miller who sent a shot to the bottom right corner of the Thunder’s goal. 

When the second half began, the Thunder quickly tied the score as junior Luke Dotts maintained possession against the Mountain Lion defense until he found an open slot to send a shot through. Dotts’ tying goal changed the game’s momentum, making the stakes of the next goal higher for both teams.

The Mountain Lions recognized the position they were in and had to change from the method they had been using.

“We had to transition from hard defense to hard offense to try and get that last goal to win,” senior Miles Solis said.

The Thunder showed determination in the attacking half for the remainder of the game, and put pressure on the Mountain Lions defense. Red Mountain sophomore goalkeeper Bradley Hernandez had shots fired at him from all angles, but didn’t allow another shot to get past him in the second half.

“He was phenomenal tonight. He’s doing fantastic. Just lights out fantastic,” Miller said.

With only four minutes remaining, the Thunder drew a ball-handling violation just outside of the box giving the Mountain Lions a free kick that the Thunder deflected. The deflection caused another ball-handling violation to be called against the Thunder, but this time inside the box. The call resulted in a penalty kick for the Mountain Lions. Hanes took the penalty, and sent the ball to the bottom right corner to give Red Mountain the lead. 

“We go into the second half, and we’re winning, so we’re trying to play hard defense for those last 40 minutes and try to etch out the win,” Solis said.

The Mountain Lions fought to the last second to hold the lead.

“We have a very good starting 11, but we’re not deep," Miller said. "So, I was a little worried because we had guys pushing the full 80 minutes, but our guys were fighting through it tonight. They had a lot of fight in them.”

“We haven’t lost at home yet. We wanted to keep that streak going,” Malachi Miller said.

The Mountain Lions wanted to both continue the six-game home win streak, and bump up their ranking in hopes of making the state playoffs. 

Red Mountain senior Daniel Arias, along with the other two captains, emphasized the importance of this win for both their state standings and for their confidence heading into their final two regular season games.

“This was a huge game," Arias said. "It was a must win for us. I want to go to state.” 

Solis also wants to take his senior year into the postseason, and believes this game will give them the push they need to do so.

“This is a really big win for us and gives us the momentum going into Chandler on Thursday," Solis said.

Red Mountain will host Chandler (5-2-1) at 6 p.m. Thursday. The Mountain Lions' final regular season game will be on March 4 at Chaparral.

Desert Vista will host Brophy Prep (9-0-1) at 6 p.m. Monday.