Garapan defends co-ed soccer title

The Garapan Elementary School Mallards successfully defended their title as soccer champions after beating the Koblerville Elementary School Umangs, 3-1, in the 2025-2026 PSS-NMIFA Elementary School Co-Ed Soccer League on Tuesday at the NMI Soccer Training Center.

It was a heart-stopper between the two powerhouse teams, with the Umangs hungry for a title while the Mallards fought tooth and nail to keep their place on the throne. After much back-and-forth that left the scoreboard blank, KobES’ Liam Palacios finally broke through and found the back of the net in the 19th minute, just before the first half ended.

After halftime, the Mallards’ offense came alive. As the second half began, GES wasted no time attacking, and Adrian Mercado fired in the equalizer to even things up—and from there, it was an all-out battle. Both teams traded close calls and near misses, keeping everyone on edge.

Rain eventually poured from the threatening skies, but it couldn’t douse the intensity on the pitch.

The Umangs had a big chance to pull ahead on a penalty, but a clutch defensive header by Napu Pangelinan kept things level at 1-1.

Then, Pangelinan worked both sides of the field and broke through to put the Mallards up, 2-1 in the 28th minute. The Umangs were not out of it yet and the battle for possession reached an all-time high. Pangelinan continued to keep the Umangs at bay with his defense, and Mercado backed him and their keeper up with another goal in the 38th minute for a commanding 3-1 game.

Time wound down and the Umang’s attempts at the goal decreased as fatigue settled in, and the Mallards held on to win their second straight championship.

For his exceptional performance in the finals, Mercado was named the Most Valuable Player. This season, there were three Golden Boot recipients all with 21 goals each—Mercado, Palacios, and Mount Carmel School’s Thomas Flores.

With Mercado and Pangelinan in the team were Lael Conlu, Shion Desebel, Kerlisa Esefou, Claire Fehrenbacker, Joaquin Leomo, Leo Li, and Mahealani Mizutani.

Head coach and 5th grade teacher Peter Loken said of their back-to-back titles, “It feels great. We worked hard all season, we played as a team all season and that was kind of the game plan heading into today. They beat us last Monday pretty handily so we went to the drawing board and tried to figure out some different strategies and we were able to execute today so the team came away with the win.”

With KobES drawing blood first, he said, “All season I’ve been saying ‘we’ll get scored on, it’ll happen, but we gotta keep head, we gotta keep fighting’, and that’s what the players did. They kept going, and they didn’t let it discourage them, and they were able to rally.”