Boys soccer: Tired Naperville Central exhausts Waubonsie Valley
Forget the celebration milkshake, Robert Comer was ready to tackle his homework instead.
The Naperville Central junior's goal in the second half helped the Redhawks break open a 4-1 boys soccer victory at Waubonsie Valley on Thursday night.
"It's been a long week," Comer said. "But it feels nice. We've had some problems on runs so I saw a good opportunity to take a loop around the back and we have so many skilled guys and Owen Jarrell sent the ball through and I just couldn't miss."
It was Comer's first varsity goal and put a definitive exclamation point on the win.
A milkshake sounded tasty to Comer, but he was more than happy for a hot, relaxing shower and for his head to hit a pillow.
"It's been a long week but this feels nice, but it was so hot and I'm ready for a shower," Comer said. "I am tired, I'm proud of how we've come back when we've been down. That was a hard win, but we deserved it."
Naperville Central (9-4, 4-1) jumped all over the host Warriors (5-5-1, 2-2-1), scoring three times in the opening half.
Cameron Strang, Zack Kokes and Nate Zain all found the back of the net in the first 40 minutes as the Redhawks quickly tried to erase the sting of Tuesday's 4-1 loss to Metea Valley.
'We know that if we can get the ball forward and get behind the defenders we're going to play well," Zain said. "If we get the ball on the ground with a 1-2 touch and lay it off we're going to get good opportunities to score. It's when we try to do it ourselves when we run into problems."
Stephan Spano got the Warriors on the scoreboard in the second half, but it was far too late for the Warriors.
"We knew after losing to Metea Valley on Tuesday they'd be even more tough and want to get us," Waubonsie Valley coach Jose Garcia said. "We couldn't match their energy or their rhythm. It's too late in the season to look at it as something to work on, but now we have to think more about where we are at with our fitness level."
On the flip side, Naperville Central coach Troy Adams could not complain with how well his team played, especially bouncing back from a tough loss to Metea Valley on Tuesday.
"It's a hard thing with high school kids," he said. "We had been rolling pretty well and then the kids start believing they can't lose. You have to remember you're only as good as the last game we played. We got ahead of ourselves. Hopefully, the guys have gotten back to where they need to be."