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Errors in this article have been corrected since publication.

The referee held a yellow card high in the air, but it quickly disappeared and was replaced by red. Tempers, and the referee, were the abiding story of the first half, as the Lancers visited the East Los Angeles College Huskies on Sept. 28, where they lost 0-3, and now have a conference record of 1-1-0.

Twenty minutes into the game on Friday and Kevin Ramirez was out with consecutive yellows. The first for a late tackle. The second, according to Ramirez, was the referee not liking what Ramirez said after a different call. With 70 minutes to play, the Lancers were two goals down and playing with 10 men.

“The ref changed the story of the game, the timeline,” said Ramirez after the game, but refused to comment any more as his emotions still ran high.

The frustration began with a penalty kick called against the Lancers in the first minutes of the game, their arguments falling on the referee’s deaf ears. The Lancers goalkeeper Alex Radillo was able to get a hand on Adolfo Larios’s kick, but not stop it bouncing into the net.

The tension grew, as the Lancers felt all the calls were going against them. Finally in the closing minutes of the first half, the referee showed a red card to the Lancers head Coach Edgar Manvelyan for comments made from the sideline.

“Well, you know, first half, it didn’t go so well.” said Associate Head Coach Henry Cabral after the game. “We got some bad calls. I don’t want to blame the referee, I would never want to do that, but the calls were a bit lopsided, and that really killed the game.”

Pasadena began the second half determined to survive. And despite allowing one more goal, finished the game with a respectable 0-3 outcome.

“Second half the guys came out and fought really hard,” said Cabral. “We had a couple opportunities to finish, [but] the ball didn’t bounce our way. In the end they were able to get one on us, but the guys played really hard.”

But there was another story to this game, almost eclipsed by the anger. It was the Huskies midfield and defense. It was good. Most times when the Lancers pushed forward, they were surrounded by three Huskies. Trying to pass the ball, let alone dribble, is almost impossible in that situation, except of course, if you’re Ronaldo. This made it very difficult for the Lancers to penetrate East LA’s defense. But despite this, with Zachery Taylor making his strong runs up the left side, there were some moments when a goal was near.

Vahagn Manoyan was able to get his head to a Taylor cross, and point it goal-ward, but the Huskies keeper kept it out with a diving save.  “That was a good chance, but I couldn’t score then,” said Manoyan after the game.

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