Two goals from Judah Mukome and a seventh clean sheet of the fall gave the Bay Counties League - East leaders a 4-0 win over Averroes, their first victory in three games.
Athenian got back to winning at the right moment. Judah Mukome scored twice as the Owls beat Averroes 4-0 in Danville on Tuesday, and the leaders of the Bay Counties League - East now head to Bentley on Friday with first place to protect.
It had been a testing week for Athenian. A 2-1 defeat at the Bay School of San Francisco on September 29 ended an eight-game unbeaten run, and College Prep came to Danville three days later for a meeting of the league's top two.
That one finished 1-1. Mukome pounced on a mistake in the College Prep back line and finished high into the net to give the Owls the lead, but Lucas Beamer levelled with a free kick just before half-time, and Mukome's last effort of the night went narrowly wide of the post. The point was still enough to lift Athenian above the Cougars and into first place.
Tuesday's game was a non-league fixture and the first meeting between the two schools on record, and the Owls shared the goals around.
Mukome, a senior, scored two. Sophomore Waris Pandher and senior Clark Li each scored one and set up another, and sophomore Tenzen Gelleck and senior Miguel Ingersol added an assist apiece. Five players had a hand in the four goals, and at the other end Athenian kept their seventh clean sheet of the fall.
The two goals take Mukome to 18 this season, with 10 assists, in nine games with recorded stats. As a junior he had nine goals and eight assists in 10, and his 5.1 points per game this fall is nearly double last season's 2.6. He has been involved in 68 percent of Athenian's recorded goals, and he is part of a deep attack. Junior Arjun Mehrotra, who scored at the Bay School, has four goals and two assists, and senior Hung Bui has set up six.
The defense has been just as dependable. Athenian have conceded 12 goals in 13 games, and four of those came in a single game, a 4-0 home loss to Arcata in August.
For Averroes, a school of 58 students from Fremont who play in NCS Division 3, it was a seventh straight defeat. The Falcons are 1-7-1, and their run has included a 6-0 loss at Bentley, Athenian's next opponent. They finished 5-5-3 last fall and have two league games left to build on.
Athenian are 9-2-2 and lead the Bay Counties League - East at 4-0-1 with four league games left. They went into the week ranked sixth in North Coast Section Division 1.
Friday will be a sterner test. Bentley are 4-4-2 and beat Saint Joseph Notre Dame 8-0 last week, a side Athenian beat 4-0 in September. Last fall, the Owls lost 8-0 at Bentley, the heaviest defeat of a 13-5-2 season.
We will see if Athenian continues to capitalize going forward.