LAKE COUNTY — The Middletown Mustangs are the No. 1 seed in the 10-team North Coast Section Division III girls” soccer playoffs, which get under way Wednesday with two first-round games.
Middletown (16-3), the North Central League I champion, and No. 4 seed Clear Lake (17-4-2), the NCL II runner-up, each have first-round byes and won”t play until Saturday”s quarterfinal round.
While the Division III field has room enough for 16 teams, only 10 met the criteria for postseason play. As a result, each of the top six seeds receive first-round byes.
The playoff teams are Middletown, No. 2 seed Sonoma Academy (17-4), the NCL II champion, No. 3 St. Vincent (15-3), the NCL II runner-up, Clear Lake, No. 5 St. Helena (11-3), No. 6 Cloverdale (13-5-3), No. 7 Calistoga (13-8-1), No. 8, Roseland Prep (12-6), No. 9 Rincon Valley Christian (10-8-1) and No. 10 St. Bernard (9-8-4).
In first-round games Wednesday, Roseland Prep plays Rincon Valley at 5 p.m. at Elsie Allen High School in Santa Rosa, and No. 10 St. Bernard visits Calistoga at 7 p.m. at the Napa County Fairgrounds.
Middletown will host the Roseland Prep-Rincon Valley Christian winner on Saturday at 7 p.m. while Clear Lake hosts St. Helena on Saturday at 7 p.m.
If Middletown and Clear Lake both win on Saturday, they will meet for a third time this season in the semifinals Nov. 9 at Middletown. The quarterfinal-round meeting between Clear Lake and St. Helena also marks the third time the Cardinals have played the Saints, each winning on the other”s homefield during the regular season.
Middletown does own a win against Roseland Prep ? 7-1 on Sept. 26 in Santa Rosa ? but has not played Rincon Valley Christian this season. Against the other top seeds, Middletown owns a win against Sonoma Academy, lost to St. Vincent, and is 1-1 against Clear Lake and 1-1 against St. Helena.
Clear Lake beat Sonoma Academy earlier this season while splitting NCL I games with Middletown and St. Helena.
“It”s going to be a good one,” Middletown coach Lee Hoage said of the Division III tournament.
“I think it”s going to be a competitive tournament,” added Clear Lake coach Paul Larrea, who is taking the Cardinals into the postseason for the 17th year in a row. “I think that they seeded it pretty well.”
Larrea said he thought the Cardinals could have been the No. 3 seed based on a 3-2 win over Sonoma Academy on Sept. 24 in Lakeport.
“We tried to get a game with St. Vincent, but they wouldn”t play us,” Larrea said. “They said they didn”t want to travel up here, but they did travel to Middletown.”
St. Vincent beat Middletown 6-5.
Last year Middletown defeated Clear Lake in a shootout in the quarterfinals before losing to St. Vincent in the semifinals for the second year in a row. Clear Lake reached the semifinals in 2009, losing to Rincon Valley.
Middletown has never reached the championship round. Clear Lake won the section in 2001, and Larrea said there are similarities between this year and 10 years ago.
“St. Vincent wouldn”t play us that year either (in the regular season) and we ended up beating them in a shootout (for the championship),” Larrea said.
After dropping their final two league games ? to St. Helena and Middletown ? Larrea said the Cardinals are ready to return to the field and are healthier than they were last week in 2-1 and 1-0 losses to those two teams.
“We”re ready to play,” Larrea said. “If we get past St. Helena, the kids would like another crack at Middletown.”
This year”s championship game is set for Nov. 12 at a site and time to be determined.
Boys” playoffs
Kelseyville High School just missed winning the NCL I championship this season under coach Eduardo Ledesma, posting a 11-2-1 record in league play to Fort Bragg”s 11-1-2, but the Knights will have to hit the road Wednesday for a first-round game against powerful Branson School of Ross, the No. 2 seed out of the Marin County Athletic League. Game time is 3:30 p.m. at the College of Marin.
The Knights posted a 13-4-1 overall record but could draw only the No. 15 seed in the 16-team Division II boys” bracket. Fort Bragg (14-5-2) fared little better, drawing the No. 12 seed.
Branson is 15-4-3 overall.
“The way I look at it, they don”t give much respect to the teams up here,” Kelseyville coach Eduardo Ledesma said of NCL I and NCL II schools, the highest seed of which is No. 11 Roseland Prep (16-4-3), the NCL II champion. “We”re going to try and gain some respect.”
Ledesma said he expects the Knights to be on the defensive as the game opens against Branson.
“We”ll study them a little bit to see what they do,” Ledesma said. “I think that”s the only thing we can do.”
While the Knights would appear to be a big underdog as the 15th seed, Ledesma said upsets happen all the time.
“Even in Mexican soccer we see the No. 1 seed lose to the bottom team,” he said. “To be able to be in the top eight or top four (of the seedings), we need to win games like this one,” he added.
The top seed is Marin Academy (15-3-2), champion of the Bay Counties League-West. University, another BCL-West school, is No. 3, and Gateway of the BCL-Central is No. 4.
If Kelseyville can score a big first-round upset, the Knights would stay on the road Saturday and meet the winner of Wednesday”s first-round game between No. 7 seed International (16-4-2) and No. 10 Head Royce (10-4-3) in the quarterfinals.
Semifinal-round games are Nov. 9 and the title game is Nov. 12 at a site and time to be determined.
