Rushing onto the field for the second half, senior midfielder Leelen Castro knew what was at stake. Van Nuys trailed Sylmar 1-0 in the Feb. 7 league championship game.
The boys soccer team hadn’t won a league title in 13 years. And Castro, who had left the team mid-season for a semi-pro club, had only been back for a few weeks.
“I was thinking that this is my only chance and if I don’t score, then I’m going to let my teammates down,” Castro said. “I’d been telling them that we’re going to win so I needed to score this no matter what. Then I shot it and I scored.”
This goal gave Van Nuys boys soccer a 1-1 tie, allowing them to rank above the Sylmar Spartans—which was enough to win the program’s first league championship in 13 years. But Castro almost wasn’t there for it. Months earlier he had left the Wolves to play for the Los Angeles Soccer Club, a semi-pro team, chasing the college exposure he felt he needed.
Castro said he left because he needed college exposure he wasn’t getting at the high school level.
“No college coaches looked at me,” he said. “I decided that I was gonna come back once I got enough college recognition from all the coaches and I saw my team was struggling a bit.”
The jump to semi-pro was immediate and physical.
“Every day I was basically fighting for my spot on the team,” Castro said. The biggest difference from semi-pro to high school is probably the physicality, aggressiveness and passion to win.”
Back at Van Nuys, the team felt his absence.
“Once I got the news that he wasn’t going to play, it lowered my morale,” senior varsity Jonathan Aguinon said. “I was happy for him, because he was playing at a really good level, but sad because he wasn’t going to play with us.”
Castro stayed close to the team even while he was away. He served as team manager and attended most games, watching from the bench instead of playing.
“The hardest part about being away from the team was that I just couldn’t play with them and share bonding moments with them,” Castro said.
Senior Dylan Villavicencio, who left the team for a semi-pro team the previous season, said he understood Castro’s choice.
“I understand why he left,” Villavicencio said. “Playing for a higher level, semi-pro, gives you a lot of benefits, like playing with people that you’ve never played against and playing with people that are more experienced.”
Castro said the semi-pro training, especially the daily conditioning, made a visible difference in his game between junior and senior year.
When the Van Nuys season hit a rough stretch and Castro felt he had the college exposure he needed, he came back.
Castro said he wasn’t nervous about the return. “During my first conversation back with my teammates, Dylan told me that he wanted to cry because I was back,” he said.
He returned in time for the final stretch of the regular season, including Senior Night.
“When I came back, I saw there needed to be a leader on the field,” Castro said. “I just stepped up, even though I wasn’t there for a while.”
Then came the league championship game, and the goal that changed everything.
After the goal, Castro ran to find Villavicencio. A cameraman on the sideline caught the celebration.
“It’s my senior year and my dad’s last year coaching me, so it felt great having a championship and sharing that with him,” Castro said.
Castro’s father, head coach Jose Castro, said the season tested him in ways that went beyond the field, including watching his son step back from a path that could have led to professional soccer.
“It was emotional, exciting and sad,” he said. “Sadness, because he did not continue being part of the highest competitive sport, which is MLS next. But happy, because I always support him in whatever decision he makes, which he loves to play with his high school friends. He had a big smile, and I could not take that away from him.”
Castro said the season changed him.
“I used to be very egotistical, a little bit in a bad way, because I thought ‘now that I’m playing my pro, I’m better than everybody,’ but in reality, I’m not,” Castro said. “It just made me want to help my teammates be even better than me.”
The season, Castro said, didn’t go the way anyone expected.
“It was all a mess, but when we all started coming together it got better,” he said.
Coach Castro said he keeps coming back to one moment from the championship game.
“We were down with maybe five minutes remaining, and we struggled the first and second half, but we kept fighting and fighting,” Coach Castro said. “But Leelen stole the ball. He wanted it really badly, and just took the shot and it went inside. It was a happy moment for me, obviously, because he did it, but, again, it’s because of the happiness that I could see on his face, calling his teammates to go and celebrate with him, that truly made everything special.”
This article originally appeared in the Early Spring 2026 print edition.
