Conant falls to Lyons in OT
Conant's first trip to the girls water polo state quarterfinals ended in a most painful fashion.
The Cougars forced overtime in their matchup with Lyons Township before falling by a final of 16-13 on Thursday night at Stevenson High School.
A total of six Conant field players - virtually the entire starting lineup, plus the first reserve - ended up with 3 ejections each, thus excluding them from the rest of the game. Lyons made it through with only one game ejection; the total number of exclusions was 36.
"It was an awesome game," said Conant coach Justin Bickus.
Senior Carmen Rosas and junior Sam Wooley finished with 4 goals apiece for Conant. The Mid-Suburban League champs finish their best-ever season with a record of 29-4.
Miranda Fenlon scored 3 goals, and Sarah Gregory and Lexi Hedman had 1 each for the Cougars. Rosas and Pauline Chowaniec both contributed 2 assists, and Nicole Mihaylova and Emily Weingart had 1 each.
Lyons jumped out to a 5-1 lead after the first quarter before Conant drew even but outscoring the Lions 4-2 in the second and third quarters.
"It took a little while to get going - it felt like we were shaking the cobwebs out," Bickus said. "But after that we made some adjustments and things started to improve."
Both teams scored 3 times in the fourth to force the extra sessions, during which Conant was outscored 4-1.
Rosas, the top scorer in the history of Conant's program, finished the season with 162 goals and 36 assists. She suffered her final exclusion late in the fourth quarter and generated 9 exclusions by Lyons before fouling out.
Conant senior all-conference goalie Maddy Demaret, who'd already made a staggering 387 saves this spring before facing Lyons, stopped 21 more shots to conclude her high school career. Included in that effort were several stops of penalty shots.
The outcome was disappointing for Conant, but Bickus and his team enjoyed the state tournament experience and the end of a highly successful run for a senior-dominated team.
"A lot of hard work and a lot of determination went into getting us here," he said. "When the girls that were seniors for us this year were freshmen, not one of them had played water polo before. We really came a long way.
"In my opinion, we've really set a different standard for the program."
Julie Cohen and Caroline Walsh scored 5 goals apiece for Lyons Township.
Lyons (22-10-1) advances to meet New Trier, a 14-3 winner against Lincoln-Way Central, at 10:15 a.m. Saturday. Fenwick and Stevenson meet in the previous semifinal at 9 a.m.