Nunez, Gomez have Wheeling looking good

Wheeling looks like a soccer club to watch as the state tournament approaches.

Sergio Nunez scored twice and had a hand in two others Thursday night as the Wildcats (5-8-1) defeated visiting Hoffman Estates 4-0.

The Wildcats, who have won two of their last three Mid-Suburban matches to improve their league record to 2-4-1, continue to impress Jose Gomez and coach Ed Uhrik.

“I really feel the improvement in this team has come from everyone getting more comfortable with each other and with the way we’re connecting better in our passing (and) scoring, especially in the past couple of games,” said Gomez, who scored twice and leads the Wildcats with 8 goals. “I am confident we can keep it going and become a team that will dangerous in the playoffs, but we’ve got to continue to work hard.”

The Wildcats showed no ill effects from their 5-5 draw with Hersey on Tuesday in a match where Wheeling gave away an early 2-goal lead before fighting back to deadlock in overtime.

“In order for us to be strong in the postseason, we’ve got to tighten things up when our opponent has created corners and dead-ball opportunities,” Uhrik said. “That’s where we struggled the other night against Hersey, but we did much better tonight with Hoffman.”

The Hawks (3-8-0, 1-6-0), who recently lost their top two players to club soccer, battled for 80 minutes — falling behind 3-0 at 50 minutes on Alfredo Jimenez’s goal.

“We couldn’t ask for any more of an effort than we received from each and every player, but with us just in Day No. 5 of losing those two guys, we’re still tweaking here and there and trying to figure out what’s best for the team as we go forward from here on out,” said Hawks coach Matt Sriver, who was also missing starting keeper Michael Gordon.

The Hawks received some quality play from junior keeper Kyle Lancor.

The Wildcats led 1-0 when Alan Flores struck from a near-impossible angle on the right side at 30 minutes, just after Lancor turned a 35-yard free kick from Irving Balboa up and over the bar.

Kevin Castro had a solid match for the Hawks with help from Octavio Herrera, Luis Ortiz and Andres Pena.

“Eddie said we owned 20 minutes of the play in each half, and he’s probably right about that, but his guys can really attack and take avantage of mistakes, which unfortunately happened to us on a couple of occasions,” Sriver said.

In the 36th minute, the Wildcats’ Daniel Dumiter ran freely up the center channel from his stopper position and fired a left-footed smash into the net on a Nunez assist.

Just moments into the second half, Castro steered a shot wide of Wildcats keeper Rogelio Laredo. Shortly thereafter, Jimenez slotted past Lancor from in close after Nunez tricked his way past a pair of defenders.

Except for a wide shot from Alex Tooren and another from Castro, the Hawks were unable to get any quality shots at Laredo.