The Long Beach City College men’s soccer team fell to No. 1 nationally-ranked Mt. San Antonio College by a final score of 4-1 in a South Coast Conference game at LBCC on Tuesday.

The loss hurt the Vikings’ postseason hopes and dropped their record to 9-8-3 overall and 5-5-3 in the SCC. Mt. SAC remains unbeaten at 16-0-3 and tops the conference standings at 11-0-2.

The Mounties showed why they are the nation’s best team as it took them just over 19 minutes jump ahead 3-0 and take LBCC out of the game.

Mt. SAC’s Heriberto Ponce scored goals in the sixth, eighth, and 19th minutes for a hat trick and the Mounties led early 3-0.

Spencer Jones made it 4-0 with his goal in the 58th minute.

LBCC finally broke up the shutout when forward Manuel Batista scored a breakaway goal in the 80th minute.

Freshman Luis Romero totaled four saves over the first 64 minutes of the contest while freshman Jorge Gastelum kept the Mounties scoreless over the final 26 minutes with two saves.

Christopher Lara posted two saves over the first 70 minutes of the game for the Mounties.

The LBCC men close out the regular season on Friday (Nov. 13) at 1 p.m. with a South Coast Conference game at Pasadena City College.

Report By LBCC’s Chris Ruiz