{"id":502173,"date":"2026-02-27T03:06:07","date_gmt":"2026-02-27T03:06:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/502173\/"},"modified":"2026-02-27T03:06:07","modified_gmt":"2026-02-27T03:06:07","slug":"birmingham-boys-soccer-wins-to-advance-to-city-open-division-final","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/502173\/","title":{"rendered":"Birmingham boys&#8217; soccer wins to advance to City Open Division final"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>In one of the strangest weeks in City Section soccer history, six-time champion Birmingham High, which was eliminated in the first round of the playoffs two weeks ago, defeated Venice 6-0 on Thursday to earn a spot against rival El Camino Real in Saturday\u2019s 6 p.m. Open Division boys\u2019 final.<\/p>\n<p>The Patriots got a second chance to avenge their earlier loss to Marquez via penalty kicks when semifinalists Marquez and South East were <a class=\"link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.latimes.com\/sports\/highschool\/story\/2026-02-25\/its-big-mess-city-section-soccer-playoffs-rocked-by-forfeits\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">removed from the playoffs for using an ineligible player<\/a>. The City Section decided to have first-round losers Birmingham and Venice play for the right to face El Camino Real.<\/p>\n<p>Five City Section teams in the playoffs have had to forfeit games because players participated in outside leagues during their high school season in violation of <a class=\"link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.latimes.com\/sports\/highschool\/story\/2026-02-25\/its-big-mess-city-section-soccer-playoffs-rocked-by-forfeits\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">CIF bylaw 600<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s been a crazy week,\u201d Birmingham goalie Alexis Villagran said. \u201cWe\u2019re blessed for the opportunity.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Birmingham coach Gus Villalobos was preparing to take back his players\u2019 uniforms this week to end the season. Now they are one win away from a City title. Players look tired at times because they hadn\u2019t practiced since their loss on Feb. 6. Villagran was allowed to play even though he took part in a club match after he thought the season ended. The state CIF approved the waiver.<\/p>\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Robert Mejia gets his second penalty kick goal. Birmingham 4, Venice 0. Bring on El Camino Real for a third time to decide Open Division title. <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/Nl77pKhFOp\" rel=\"nofollow\">pic.twitter.com\/Nl77pKhFOp<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 eric sondheimer (@latsondheimer) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/latsondheimer\/status\/2027177254841937951?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">February 27, 2026<\/a>     <\/p>\n<p>Robert Mejia, who scored two goals on penalty kicks and has 26 goals this season, is in his first year playing for Birmingham after being a member of the L.A. Galaxy youth academy program. He said both his club coach and high school coach made it clear you can\u2019t play club during the high school season.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe all know the rules,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>The continual violation of CIF bylaw 600 has left City Section commissioner Vicky Lagos scrambling to replace teams. The latest team to discover a violation was Gardena in Division III, allowing Sun Valley Magnet to advance to the final. Lagos also received information about City Division II finalist Garfield, but as of Thursday night, she said the Bulldogs have been cleared to play Santee in the final.<\/p>\n<p>After a scoreless first half, Birmingham sophomore Hayden Quiambao started a six-goal surge with a header to open the second half.<\/p>\n<p> <script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In one of the strangest weeks in City Section soccer history, six-time champion Birmingham High, which was eliminated&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":502174,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[440],"tags":[200573,49,48,199914,200576,200575,34096,200572,199908,37501,8987,3468,200574,6903,561,82,9500,200571,2813],"class_list":{"0":"post-502173","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-soccer","8":"tag-birmingham-boy","9":"tag-ca","10":"tag-canada","11":"tag-cif-bylaw","12":"tag-city-section","13":"tag-early-loss","14":"tag-goal","15":"tag-high-school-season","16":"tag-ineligible-player","17":"tag-marquez","18":"tag-penalty-kick","19":"tag-playoff","20":"tag-rival-el-camino-real","21":"tag-season","22":"tag-soccer","23":"tag-sports","24":"tag-thursday","25":"tag-violation","26":"tag-week"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/502173","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=502173"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/502173\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/502174"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=502173"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=502173"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=502173"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}