St. Augustine scores 3 second-half goals to beat Point Loma – elcajon newson Elcajon News only

The defending CIF San Diego Section Open Division champion, St. Augustine High School’s boys soccer team is focused on delivering more hardware in 2025.

And thanks to three second-half goals on Tuesday afternoon, the Saints look more and more like the team to beat.

St. Augustine came to life after halftime, beating visiting Point Loma 3-0 to stay undefeated in league play.

The possibility of 21st Western League heading back to Nutmeg Street seems that much more likely.

“Point Loma is a big rival for us,” Saints coach Brendan Johnston said. “We always meet them in the league, and we’ve seen them in the playoffs a lot over the last 10 years. We expected them to fight, and I thought our guys did a good job of playing on the front foot in the second half. It’s a big win for us.”

It wasn’t easy.

Point Loma did an excellent job of controlling possession and the pace of the game for most of the first half.

The Pointers started quickly, getting shots on goal from Fin Rohnow and Ezekiel Varela in the sixth and ninth minutes. Their aggressive play led to five first-half corner kicks and two free kicks in the attacking third.

St. Augustine’s normally quick offensive attack struggled to find its footing in the game’s early stages.

The Saints’ best look at goal in the first half came on one of their opening touches.  Forward Luke Weinpel’s header off an excellent long pass from Carlos Delgado missed just wide of the near post.

The teams went into the halftime knotted in a scoreless tie.

“I told the guys at the half to just be a little more thoughtful with our execution, runs off the ball, and anytime a wide situation presents itself, we need guys running through the back of the net,” Johnston said.

The vaunted Saints attack finally showed up to the party in the second half. Six minutes in, sophomore Maximo Piancone found the back of the net off an excellent pass into the middle of the box from Emiliano Postlethwaite to give St. Augustine a 1-0 edge.

Six minutes later, the Saints (10-3-1, 3-0-1) struck again. After drawing a free kick, Santiago Postlethwaite laced a frozen rope past into the top-right corner of the net to give St. Augustine a 2-0 lead.

And in the 66th minute, Weinpel put the game away with a header off a long throw-in by Miles Hess.

“Max did a great job of finishing that ball from just a couple feet off the line,” Johnston said. “It’s huge for him to get these minutes and play with this upperclassman now, so when the table gets flipped and there seniors and juniors, they can work out guys who were in their shoes as freshmen and sophomores.”