SARATOGA -- In their penultimate home match of the year, West Valley women's soccer leapfrogged the Las Positas Hawks in the Coast-South table to continue their final push to a postseason berth.

The Vikings (7-9-2, 3-5-1 Coast-South) scored a pair of goals in each half, needing every last one to inch past a pair of pushes from the Hawks (7-9-3, 2-6-2 Coast-South), winning 4-3.

"That was an exciting game," said head coach Fred Espinoza. "We knew we needed that to have a chance at the playoffs, and the girls stepped up."

A number of tactical changes made the difference for the Vikings. In just her second start of the season, Jasmine Garcia slotted in to the defensive midfield, allowing West Valley to play freshman Victoria Rodriguez higher up on the attack.

"[Assistant coach April Lopez] and I had talked about the definition of insanity," said Espinoza, "and we were trying to play the same people over and over, expecting different results, and it wasn't working. So we switched things up, we moved [Rodriguez] from the defensive mid up to forward, generated a goal quickly and just went from there."

Garcia, limited to ten-to-twenty minute spurts in her earlier matches, played close to 80 against the Hawks. She was lethal controlling the pace along with Daniela Morales Sanchez in the midfield.

"The formation change is going to stay," said Espinoza. "Having Jasmine back from her ACL injury is huge. She feels comfortable on her knee, she's not stressed if it'll hurt, she's 100 percent right now. She's making a huge difference in the middle of the park."

West Valley scored twice early. The red-hot Evelyn Santos missed the opening goal by a matter of fingertips of Las Positas keeper Jordan Tovar, but Ximena Heredia was in the perfect position up top to finish the play.

Minutes later, Morales Sanchez blasted one from outside of the attacking box that slipped through Tovar's hands to double the lead. The owner of a team-high seven assists this season, the goal marked Morales Sanchez's first.

When Las Positas tapped one in near the end of the first half and finished another in the 70^th minute, it would have been easy for the Vikings to give in. It was a similar game script to that of the loss to a top-15 Hartnell squad. Especially without star goalie Soleana Chavez, the match presented a tough scenario with all the momentum going the way of the Hawks.

But twice following the equalizer, West Valley's defense stood tall. Goalie Analena Perez, starting in Chavez's spot, parried away a one-on-one attack with Reece Bingham. Off a corner just seconds later, freshman Aubrianna Martinez was heroic, cleaning up a ball that sat on the goal line for an eternity.

"She saved us in the first half," said Espinoza, acknowledging the stellar play of Perez on back-to-back tries early on, "and in the second half she made two saves that really saved the game for us. With [Chavez] getting injured and [Perez] stepping up -- I knew she would be ready. She had some doubts about herself, but she was awesome."

For Perez, the instincts were a matter of confidence.

"She does the training and work," said Espinoza. "I see the work she puts in, and it's just a mental thing. I was a goalkeeper in high school too. We're a different breed. You want the shots on you, you really don't care if they score on you. Your teammates are going to respect you. If a ball goes in badly, they're not going to worry about it."

Sometimes, the saying "defense turns into offense" is overused. But the Vikings took their defensive intensity and ran with it. On an even three-on-three counter, Santos took the top off the defense from to the right side of the box and found Heredia, who dropped a perfect ball to the back post to find a waiting Santos, who gave West Valley the lead.

"That's part of the change of the formation," said Espinoza, "to get Ximena and Evelyn up top together. That have that chemistry, they have it at practice. And now it's showing up in the game. They don't even need to have any verbal communication, they just instinctively know where they're at, and now it's showing."

Nine minutes later, off an in-swinging corner from Rodriguez, Santos created space outside of the mixer and planted the dagger, curling the finish past Tovar. It's a goal that has become Santos' signature, almost directly mirroring one she had to finish the half against Hartnell.

While Heredia has been getting the scoring attention, and rightfully so, it's Santos who has dominated of late. She's got six goals over her last seven matches, also adding four assists in that stretch.

With momentum back on the Vikings' side, they have two more matches against teams near the bottom of their respective tables. First, on the road on Tuesday to take on Skyline.