Glenbard South, Rolling Meadows come up even

Coming off losses in their girls soccer season openers, Rolling Meadows and Glenbard South battled to a 0-0 draw Thursday night in Glen Ellyn.

The Raiders (0-1-1) held off a Mustangs attack that needed a finishing touch in the final third after putting together some good build-up play through midfielder Katherine Perille and forward Taylor Gunn.

With the help of 10 saves from goalkeeper Jacquelyn Wescott, the Raiders held on defensively, a big step forward from allowing 7 goals against Oswego East in their season opener.

"It was a significant improvement over our first match, in particular on their work rate," said Raiders coach Glen Eggert. "Everything good comes from hard work, so as they're beginning to buy into that it gives them a chance to start working on the X's and O's of the game where we can start plying more together and that sort of thing."

With a little back and forth play to start the game, Rolling Meadows (0-1-1) found more possession in the middle of the field when Perille and midfielders Madeline Rebsamen and Claire Preissing got on the ball.

The Mustangs' best scoring chance came in the 14th minute when Perille got on the ball all alone at the top of the penalty area but hit her low shot wide.

From then the Mustangs continued to work on the wings and through the middle of the field. But combined with their lack of sharpness in front of goal and the Raiders' defense, Rolling Meadows couldn't break the deadlock.

"I think it's a little combination of everything," Mustangs coach Mike Drenth said. "I think it's just a little bit of lack of confidence up towards the goal because we have a pretty nice build-up and then we kind of get near the goal and no one wants to shoot and everyone's looking to pass. For the most part the girls played pretty well."

The Raiders struggled to get going offensively with a lack of possession and link-up play, but when junior forward Taylor Ray got on the ball there was always a possibility that something could happen.

Ray used sharp cuts with her size and speed to go at defenders but never had enough support to really build an attack.

The best scoring chance came in the second half for Glenbard South when a ball came out to captain Fiona VanTeylingen about 25 yards from the Mustangs' net. VanTeylingen hit a one-time volley that just hit off the far post to deny the senior a wonder goal.

Mustangs sophomore goalkeeper Kelsey Nallon had 4 saves to preserve her first shutout of the year.