Kelleher's return sparks South Elgin to regional title

At practice Thursday, South Elgin girls soccer coach Tiffany Disher harped on the importance of the first 10 minutes of her team's Class 3A regional final Friday afternoon against Streamwood.

Her charges listened, and listened good.

Paced by 3 goals in the first 13 minutes of the contest, the Storm dispatched the Sabres 5-0 and in the process won a regional final for the second year in a row. The team advanced to Tuesday's sectional semifinal at Huntley to play Cary-Grove at 7 p.m.

"Our goal was to go first 10," said Disher, whose team improved to 10-10-2 by outshooting Streamwood 20-9. "(Thursday) in practice, we worked on, 'This is just 10 minutes, we're going hard for this 10 minutes,' for different drills. I think they really took that to heart and they made sure they were focused for that first 10.

"It really does make a huge difference, whether we get into the frantic mode or whether we are able to capitalize on our opportunities."

South Elgin made the most of the opening stages of the contest. The fans had barely settled into their seats when junior midfielder Sydney Shephard fired a shot that bounced off the hands of Streamwood goalkeeper Yasmine Resendiz … right to a waiting sophomore striker Ella Struwing, who chipped the ball into the left corner of the net.

Six minutes later, Shephard floated a high pass from the right side past a drawn-out Resendiz to senior forward Delaney Kelleher, who also found the left corner of the net.

And 4 minutes after that, sophomore midfielder Gracie Franks fired a pass from the far right side to Kelleher, who immediately passed back into the middle to sophomore midfielder Melissa Greco, who planted it - you guessed it - into the left corner of the net.

Just like that, it was South Elgin 3, Streamwood 0. And as it turned out, it was more than enough goals for the Storm to send them into sectional play.

"We had a couple of uncharacteristic mistakes early in the game, and once we got in that hole, it was tough to get out of," said Streamwood coach Matt Polovin, whose team ended its season at 12-12. "It's hard against any team, and South Elgin had a nice run against us today."

A big reason was the return from injury of Kelleher, who missed her team's 8-0 regional seminal victory over Larkin. On Friday, she added a second-half goal and assisted on 2 others. While the victory was sweet, she knows there is a lot of work ahead, in order to make up for a tight loss to Harlem in the sectional semifinals last year.

"Last year, we did lose, but now we know what to expect," she said. "The competition gets harder, but we're definitely ready to play. We're even hungrier this year than we were last year."

Shephard, who moved midseason from defender to midfield, contributed a goal early in the second half and a pair of near-misses. She added that tough competition from Larkin and Streamwood in the regional will pay dividends next week.

"We had a harder bracket this year than we did last year, so it kind of helped us prepare for the sectional games," she said.

Disher, in her ninth season as head coach, pointed to a tough 10-game winless stretch against strong competition that ended against Larkin as a key reason her team is in its current position.

"We played great teams and we played great soccer, but we just couldn't come out on top," she said. "Now that we've started our new season here, we're 2-0 on the new season and we're hoping to go a little further."

The game spelled the end of a terrific career for Streamwood senior striker Tawny Carroll, who will be plying her trade at Drake University next year. She was marked all afternoon by South Elgin defenders Veronica Noyszewski and Corinne Hildebrandt and as a consequence her opportunities to shoot were few and far between. She got close in the 65th minute, driving down the center, juking a defender and firing a shot that was just wide right of the goal.

But it just wasn't to be Friday for Carroll and her teammates. Still, a victory notwithstanding, she's got something almost as valuable - memories.

"There's a lot to remember," she said. "I think just the effort of my team, being the underdogs, playing against these awesome teams … I think I'm just going to miss everyone's effort, my teammates, my coach, he puts everything into it. It's sad leaving."