Girls Soccer: Grayslake North defeats Zoin-Benton
Grayslake North's Kelly Meyer (17) and Zion Benton's Nadia Ramirez (11) during the first half of Thursday's match at the Lake's Invitational. | Brian O'Mahoney~for Sun-Times Media
Updated: April 19, 2012 9:39PM
Grayslake North opened its girls soccer season with five straight wins, then couldn’t beat anybody for six straight games.
But Thursday, the Knights got back on track, edging Zion-Benton 2-1 in the Lakes tournament.
Saturday morning, Grayslake (6-6-1 overall) will complete pool play against Woodstock North (7-3-2 overall), and the Knights must win the game by at least two goals to assure themselves a spot in Saturday afternoon’s championship game.
In the other four-team pool, Richmond (11-1-1 overall) is 2-0 and plays Antioch on Saturday morning. The Sequoits are 1-1 in pool play after a 2-0 loss to Vernon Hills on Thursday.
“We’ve been struggling a little bit, but we worked together as a team today and were able to hopefully get past that rough patch. It’s really nice to be on top again,” said Grayslake senior keeper and captain Brooke Sauer. “Every year, we always want to win this tournament. It’s a good gauge for how we’re playing. Lakes always has a strong team, and we know Woodstock North is pretty tough. We’re going to have to come out strong against Woodstock North and show that we deserve to win it.”
Jaclyn Brennan scored from Sam Villwock, and Katie Lahera scored unassisted as the Knights built a 2-0 lead.
Zion’s Hannah Magiera scored on a PK in the 77th minute, which was costly for Grayslake as it now means it must beat Woodstock North by two goals Saturday to win the tiebreaker and play for the title rather than just post a regulation-time win.
Injuries were the reason why Grayslake struggled, as key players such as Katie McGrath, Brennan, Hannah Mitchem and Kelly Casey (still out) all went down.
“Every single goal was a one-goal loss,” noted Grayslake coach Adam DeCaluwe. “We were in every game. We were discouraged to a small extent, but we realized the big picture.
“With girls out, it means more girls are getting opportunities and more girls are gaining experience. We don’t want to experience losses, but you tend to learn the most from your losses, as long as you’re learning the lessons. Whether we did or not, that’s still up in the air, but we’re hoping we did.”
On another field, Lakes was no match for Woodstock North.
“It wasn’t our day,” said Eagles coach Kevin Kullby. “They have two players of really good quality (sisters CariAnn and Marta Sobey) and they were the difference today.”
© 2013 Sun-Times Media, LLC. All rights reserved. This material may not be copied or distributed without permission. For more information about reprints and permissions, visit www.suntimesreprints.com. To order a reprint of this article, click here.
Comments Click here to view or make a comment