Tourney championship hits home for Vernon Hills

Brad Burrows and Jeremy Cohen scored second-half goals, and Vernon Hills’ boys soccer team captured its own invite championship by edging Taft 2-1 Tuesday.

Ricky Ceja and Tony Orozco earned assists for the Cougars, who improved to 4-0. It was a scoreless game at halftime.

“Great start for the boys, but we need to continue to push each other daily,” Vernon Hills coach Mike McCaulou said. “We will enjoy this (Tuesday) and (Wednesday). Then it is back to improving for the next task.”

Mundelein 7, Carmel 2: Seven players scored for the Mustangs, who opened up a 4-1 advantage by halftime.

The Mustangs’ goal scorers were Pepe Gonzalez, Armando Gomez, Carlos Huaracha, Lino Garcia, Hector Ruiz, Yann Nsoda and Stephen Wald. Gomez and Huaracha each had 2 assists. Donnie Kvien and Mason Homsey also earned assists for Mundelein (3-2-1).

Grant 2, Grayslake North 1: At Vernon Hills, the Bulldogs prevailed 4-2 in penalty kicks, as Manuel Garcia netted the game-winner.

Jorge Hurtado scored in regulation for Grant and was assisted by Kevin Peralta. Keeper Nick Heidenthal made 8 saves for the Bulldogs.

Grayslake North (2-3) got its goal from Gavin Amburn, assisted by Marcelino Velazquez. It was a 1-1 game at halftime.

“Throughout the remainder of regulation and overtime, we created several quality scoring chances that either just missed or their keeper made some nice saves on,” Grayslake North coach Adam DeCaluwe said. “We had a lot of possession and seemed to have Grant pinned back for good periods of time but never got the final touch necessary to find the goal we needed to win the game.”