SAN JOSE – With half of the PayPal Park crowd booing the hosts and zeroes still burned on the scoreboard, the young San Jose Earthquakes looked to a local kid to beat the visiting Oakland Roots.
Eighteen-year-old San Jose midfielder Niko Tsakiris, a Saratoga native, knifed through the Roots midfield and pinged a through ball to forward Ousseni Bouda on the right wing late in the second half.
Bouda, one-on-one with Palo Alto’s own Paul Blanchette and standing just inside the penalty box, used his powerful right foot to send a thunderbolt into the back of the net in the 77th minute.
“You’re determined to make your stamp on the game, and he did that,” Tsakiris said while looking at the goalscorer postgame. “For us young guys playing in the tournament, it’s another experience and an opportunity to get on the field.”
One goal was all San Jose would need to advance past its East Bay opponent in a 1-0 victory in the US Open Cup knockout tournament game.
“He’s the No. 8 now and for the future for this club, this league and the national team one day,” Quakes coach Luchi Gonzalez said. “You’ve got to love his mentality, because when he makes mistakes, he just shakes it off.”
It was a bitterly disappointing result for many of those in attendance.
Oakland fans weren’t the majority, but they were the loudest. Many came to voice their displeasure with Earthquakes owner John Fisher, who is moving their beloved A’s baseball team to Sacramento next season.
“Anytime you get to play David vs. Goliath, and Goliath being in your backyard, it’s going to be a little bit extra in there,” Roots coach Gavin Glinton said when asked about the Oakland fan presence. “It’s very difficult, if not impossible, to separate from it completely, but I thought they did a good job of controlling their emotions and sticking with the gameplan.”
While Roots and A’s supporters chanted “sell the team” at different points in the game, a number of unfamiliar faces made noise on the field for the Quakes.
Earthquakes coach Gonzalez over the past week had told media that the team took the Open Cup seriously after the team lost to lowly Monterey FC in last year’s competition. But when facing the USL side in the fourth round of the knockout tournament, he sat every starter.
Even though the San Jose lineup was short on experience, it was bursting with intrigue. 18-year-old goalkeeper Emi Ochoa, who signed with the club as a 14-year-old back in 2019, made his first start ever for the Earthquakes’ first team.
“Players are never going to be ready until they’re put into these situations and are challenged,” Gonzalez said. “Emi was put into a pressure-packed situation, and he rose to it.”
He performed admirably as the last line of an inexperienced defense that was facing the normal Roots starting lineup, a unit that defeated fan-faves El Farolito FC in the previous round. San Jose, as a MLS side, did not enter the tournament until the fourth round.
Johnny Rodriguez and Irakoze Donasiyano put the young keeper under pressure in the final 10 minutes of the first half, with Rodriguez barely missing a low shot wide of the left post with about three minutes on the clock.
“We weren’t happy with our first half today, it could’ve bounced their way and complicated the game,” Gonzalez said. “But we found a way.”
Quakes defender Tanner Beason got a shot blocked right in front of goal and few seconds before the halftime whistle blew. He could only bury his head in frustrated hands as the teams walked into the halftime locker room locked in a scoreless draw.
Two minutes after the halftime break, Ochoa made a brilliant save against a close Niall Logue shot in the box. On the other side, Oakland centerbacks Logue and Gagi Margvelashvili held their own against the Quakes front line.
San Jose forward Jack Skahan’s knifing run across the pitch resulted in a saved shot in the 63rd minute, but that moment marked a shift in the game’s tenor.
Subbed in for highly-touted Argentine midfielder Hernan Lopez at halftime, Earthquake forward Bouda torched Roots up and down the right wing in the second half.
“I try to get into dangerous spaces, especially in between the lines so it’s difficult for their centerbacks to jump in,” Bouda said. “In those dangerous areas, if I can get the ball, then I can slip someone in or get a shot off.”
He often combined with the youthful Tsakiris to put Oakland’s Paul Blanchette under a barrage of shots. Through 77 minutes though, the 6-foot-4 shot-stopper kept his composure and a clean sheet.
That was until Tsakiris became the youngest Earthquakes player to get an assist in an Open Cup game. San Jose spent the next 15 or so minutes continuing to control possession, creating a few other shots but more importantly burning clock until the final whistle blew.
San Jose will play the winner of Sacramento Republic and Monterey Bay FC.
