Academy Teams Earn Draw and Win at The Home Depot Center

The LA Galaxy Youth Academy teams earned a win and a draw this afternoon at The Home Depot Center. The U-16's played to a 0-0 draw with Pateadores while the U-18's scored a goal on either side of halftime to earn a 2-1 win over Pateadores.

Both teams were playing their first competitive games since early December but managed to put on a show for the nearly 1,000 fans who came out to The Home Depot Center this afternoon.

Galaxy head coach Bruce Arena, associate head coach Dave Sarachan and assistant coach Trevor James, the Galaxy's Director of Player Development, were all in attendance at the games, closely watching the Galaxy stars of tomorrow.


The U-16's remained unbeaten in Divisional play with their 0-0 draw, but very nearly claimed all three points. Goalkeeper Joshua McNeely and the rest of coach Kenny Arena's defense limited the visitors chances throughout the match. However, the Galaxy were unable to find a breakthrough at the other end of the field and the game finished scoreless.

The U-16's are now 1-0-2 for five points in Divisional play and 4-4-3 overall on the season.

Later in the day, David Vaudreuil's Galaxy U-18's were able to go one better than their U-16 counterparts with a 2-1 win. Matthew Mardesich scored his first goal of the season to give the Galaxy a 1-0 lead with a header early in the first half before Ruben Valencia scored the game-winner midway through the second half. That goal was his third of the season and helped the 18's improve to 2-0-1 in the Division and 4-3-3 overall.

Be sure to check back to both this site and lagalaxy.com on Monday for complete photo galleries (courtesy of German Alegria) from both games.