Girls soccer: Fenton bowls over first-round foe
The Fenton girls soccer team closed out the regular season in strong fashion, going 3-0-2 over its final five matches.
The Bison carried that momentum into their playoff opener on Wednesday, dominating play in a 6-0 victory over North Grand in the Class 2A regional they hosted in Bensenville.
Eighth-seeded Fenton advances to Saturday's 11 a.m. regional final against No. 2-seed Latin.
"I told them that we needed to come out and take care of business," Fenton coach Victor Ruiz said. "Just get used to the tempo of the game and get in a rhythm - use this game to set us up for Saturday."
The Bison indeed came out strong, scoring four times in the first 35 minutes of the contest. In addition the home team put 9 more shots on goal and had 11 corner kicks in the first half.
Natalie Diaz opened the scoring by bending in a corner kick, as the ball sneaked in by the near post. She added another goal on a breakaway a few minutes later.
"We all were connecting and playing our game," said Diaz, who also scored on a corner kick earlier in the spring at the Niles West tournament. "We were really focused, we didn't want this to be our last game. We came out and did what we were doing in practice.
"We've all put in a lot of work. We had a couple of bumps during the year, we had a couple of hard losses. But we've been focused ever since those hard losses."
Ruiz played everyone on his bench; in fact, 22 players were on the field during the opening 40 minutes.
Goals by Juliana Ibarez and Diana Catalan increased the margin to 4-0 before Summer Garcia found the net twice in the second half.
"Our motto this year has been finish," Ruiz said. "Last year we had a lot of games where we didn't finish and we ended up on the wrong side of things. I talked to them this year and said if you get opportunities, finish."
Cindy Osorio and Patricia Acosta combined for the shutout in goal, stopping 3 shots.
Now the task gets tougher on Saturday in the form of Latin.
"They will be tough competition," Diaz said. "They make a lot of good runs. We need to pressure them and close them down and hopefully get that win."