Boylan sharp against WW South
Rockford Boylan (5-0-1) maintained its 100 percent record in pool play Friday at Barrington, and in doing so earned a fifth straight tournament final of the Barrington Classic after defeating Wheaton Warrenville South 3-0 Friday afternoon on the turf at Barrington Community Stadium.
"The effort today, not the result, was much better than our game on Wednesday with Warren," said WW South coach Guy Callapari, whose club fell to 2-3-1 overall. "We struggle a little at the onset, but I thought there were a lot of good things to take from this game. We gave up that early goal on a well-hit ball that was helped by the wet and slippery turf, then saw a 30-yard free kick get into the back of the net. And later when we were pushing numbers, they got that late goal.
"Maybe the 3-0 wasn't indicative of how we played, but again, I felt we did pretty well."
The Titans, who won here a year ago over Barrington, dominated the early exchanges, and at 13 minutes, Alexis Galvez was on target when his looping 25-yard drive skipped into the back of the net to put Boylan out in front for good.
"We were a little flat in the beginning, but compared to that Warren game, our play was so much better from front-to-back," said WW South captain Elliot Kettle. "There's a lot of new faces on this roster, many who haven't played at this level, and because of that, it's taking some time for the guys to learn the system. But I am seeing improvement each time out."
The Tigers' attack began to come alive in the final 7-8 minutes of the first period, and with Kettle, Danny Jimenez and Javi Rosas at the controls, South began to put some pressure on the Titans and fine back-liners, Tristan Davenport and Nick Krahmer.
The quality work from South continued after intermission, and boosted by some stout play from its backline of Ian Daniel, Anthony Bernardi, Luis Cruz and Chris Stamatopoulos, the Tigers were able to keep Boylan in its own in the opening 10 minutes.
Good fortune fell to the Titans when Davenport unloaded a long-range free kick directly into the back of the net to double the Boylan advantage in the 49th minute.
The Tigers nearly cut the lead in half with a trio of chances, beginning with a curling left-footed strike from Haris Hadzic, which went just wide of the back post at the hour mark. Moments later, Kettle struck a wicked blast from 25 yards which forced keeper Nathan Wisbey to go airborne to push the drive over the bar in the 65th minute.
The corner kick which followed bounded about the box like a ping-pong ball until Wisbey pulled the dangerous chance out of the air.
Galvez dashed the Tigers' hopes with a 79th-minute goal to end the scoring.
"We're still a work in progress somewhat, and maybe after this weekend we will go back and tinker with things a bit - including changing our system a little bit to adapt to what we have," said Callipari. "Again, the effort has been very good, and that's all we ask."