Shadow Ends Regular Season With Win

The Spokane Shadow may have done it the hard way, but at least they did it.

The Shadow finished the regular season with a 1-0 overtime win against the Southern California Gunners (4-15, 3-10) Saturday night at Spokane Falls Community College.

Defender Stuart Rose tallied the only goal off an Eli Zehner pass with less than 2 minutes left.

“We had three defenders back, and they only had a four (defensive) back, so I pushed up and … they left me wide open and I just slotted it in there,” said Rose.

Even with several good scoring chances missed, Rose thinks they are right where they need to be.

“We have two weeks until the playoffs, so I imagine the next couple of practices we’ll probably take it easy and then we’ll hit it hard,” he said.

The Shadow will host the Western Premier League USISL playoffs August 10-11 at SFCC. Spokane is the No. 1 seed and will face No. 4 seed Colorado Springs.

In Saturday’s regular-season finale, the Shadow (17-3, 12-2) looked like they would score on several occasions and put the game out of reach. Each time, however, the Gunners goalkeeper Danilo Legiuzamon and Jay Schneider slammed the door shut.

Leguizamon made a spectacular catch on Spokane’s Ryan Edwards after Rose headed the ball halfway down the field.

Halfway through the first half, Shadow defenseman Dave Berto sliced his way past the Gunners’ Gabriel Cabera only to shoot the ball wide right, just missing the corner of the net. Minutes later Berto repeated the same shot and missed again.

Ten minutes later, Jeff Rose’s rocket shot deflected off the left goal post and the Shadow were unable to pick up the rebound before it went out of bounds.

Then Jeff Rose came back with a shot that should have put Spokane on the board. Rose juked Leguizamon to the right and brought him out of the goal as Rose had a clear shot on goal. But Southern Cal’s Cesar Mecedo picked off the ball from in between the legs of Rose that brought a loud groan from the 1,008 spectators.

But it wasn’t just the Shadow casting a glare over the Gunners goal. Southern Cal kept Spokane goalie Bill May awake with several good shots.

May stopped Southern Cal’s blasts from every angle imaginable, including two in a row when an errant rebound got away from the Shadow defenseman and May had to scramble to make the diving save in front of the goal.

The Shadow have yet to face Colorado and only know they are facing a team that is on a 10-game win streak.

However, the Shadow have won their last four games, two by shutouts by goalkeeper Bill May.