WW South edges Leyden in shootout
Nathan Friedle came to the rescue three times in the shootout before teammate Kevin Noonan buried his spot kick to stun No. 10 Leyden 2-1 on Saturday and send Wheaton Warrenville South into the second round of the 12th annual PepsiCo Showdown.
The Tigers (3-5-0) will likely face No. 7 seed New Trier on Tuesday at the Trevians Northfield campus when this 32-team tournament continues.
"Adam (Mrzlak) is our starting keeper and a senior captain so I don't want to take anything away from him, and what he does for our team, but it was nice to team up with him to help get us a win today," said Friedle, who split time between the sticks, both in regulation and during shootout at the Lyons Soccer Complex in LaGrange on Friday.
Friedle turned away counterpart, Alfredo Recendez, in the second round when he went in full extension to his right - then stopped David Senk to keep things even at 1-1.
Danny Jimenez and Adrian Guzman converted while the Leyden duo of Krystian Havran and Salvador Salgado canceled out the Tigers' pair to send the first-rounder into sudden-death.
Once there, Recendez saved, as did Friedle, setting up the heroics of Noonan, who then watched Esteban Hernandez go wide to secure the victory for coach Guy Callipari's club.
"We like to play attractive, entertaining soccer when we come out, but we were a short-handed with two away at ACT testing, plus playing a few guys with just a little experience - so we had to change things up tactically and play more direct than usual," said Callipari, the longtime Tigers coach, whose club opened the season winless in its first five matches but since has gone 3-0-0. "Leyden applied a lot of pressure with their speed and physical play so we had to do things differently. Although we didn't create a lot of chances, we were able to get ourselves into overtime."
The Eagles (5-1-1) generated most of the half-chances during the first 80 minutes. Their best opportunity came in the 13th minute when Hernandez ran onto a loose ball before unloading a 15-yard missile. Mrzlak fearlessly stayed with to make a goal-saving reaction save.
Five minutes later, all-state striker Albert Arabik broke down the Tigers on the left side and fired in his fifth goal of the season with his angled shot that found the far inside netting.
Arabik's goal created a storm front in the Tigers' end. Moments later, the combined tackle from Jon Suh and Jackson Keske ended the hopes of Havran who carried unhindered into the box.
Angel Lopez sent Hernandez through just before intermission, but he, too, was tackled nicely off the ball by senior Kyle Faith.
Just after the break, another great opportunity for the Eagles ended when Ethan Weseman's retrieving mission ended with the junior taking Lopez's attempt off the line.
"That's soccer," said Leyden coach Mark Valintis. "You've got to finish in this game, and when we didn't, you saw the referee put (Wheaton) at the spot late in the game when he saw a hand ball in the box."
The Tigers found some life and forced Recendez to come off his line to pull down a Jack Schlegel serve into the box before saving a Jimenez strike on frame.
Anthony Berardi steered in the equalizer in the 78th minute when the assistant referee detected a hand ball, which set forth into action a pair of five-minute extra sessions, and seven rounds of shootout action.
"Credit to Wheaton Warrenville," Valintis said. "They played hard and never gave in, and that allowed them to stay in it right until the end."
"A lot of guys who usually play 10 minutes here and there received plenty more time today," Callipari said. "And they all did a good job.
"We want to use this week at the tournament to develop, and learn some things, so it was good to see (them) come through for us today."