Lake Forest denies Lakes
Lakes entered Thursday night’s North Suburban Conference boys soccer title match hoping to become the first squad from the Prairie Division to hoist the championship hardware.
The Eagles’ attacking style was effective, but visiting Lake Forest prevailed 3-2 in Lake Villa, scoring the only goal of the second half.
“We played some good soccer,” Lakes coach Kevin Kullby said. “There were two teams with comparable ability. Somebody wins and somebody loses. This time (Lake Forest) got three in and we got only two. We played as strong from the first minute to the last minute. It wasn’t our night.”
Lakes (11-9-1) had edged Lake Forest 2-1 in the season-opening Lake Forest Shootout, scoring off a pair of set plays.
Before Thursday’s rematch, Kullby and Lake Forest coach Rob Parry shared a glance.
“We said we don’t remember a thing,” Parry said. “But what I remembered was that we didn’t defend the set pieces and didn’t pick up the garbage.”
Lake Forest (12-4-1) won its first NSC championship since 1989.
“It’s really cool to get it,” Parry said. “We talked about being a sleeper at the end of the season. Our schedule got tougher finishing with Libertyville, Lake Zurich, Lake Forest Academy and New Trier. We always thought we’d be a tough out. Nobody is going to want to play us now.”
The Scouts’ James Ankenman scored the game-winning goal in the 47th minute, taking a loose ball and firing it into the back of the net.
“The ball just fell to me and I put it in,” Ankenman said of his fourth goal of the season. “I was just running and charging toward the keeper. The ball went off my right foot. It was all for the conference championship.”
Lakes kept attacking and generated quality chances throughout. But Lake Forest keeper Sam Audley made 3 impressive stops and had 13 for the game.
“We had every chance (to tie) and restarts,” Kullby said. “We created a number of chances on goal and situations. At the end, we missed that finishing touch. To (Lake Forest’s) credit, they hung in there and played some very good defense when they needed it most.”
Kevin Goon got the Scouts on the board in the 15th minute on a head flick from an Ian Forlow free kick.
Lakes’ Jonathan Stanley tied the game three minutes later, ripping in a shot that glanced under the crossbar. Ramon Marin picked up the assist.
The Scouts pulled ahead 2-1 in the 37th minute, when Peter Passalino scored an unassisted goal off a Lakes bad clearance in the back.
But Stanley tied the game again with his 20th goal of the season 47 seconds later, knocking in a header off a Bojan Zgonjanin kick.
“Things didn’t go our way and we had our chances to finish,” Stanley said. “We just didn’t put the ball in the back of the net. (Lake Forest) played a strong defense against us.”