Girls soccer: Vernon Hills, Antioch claim playoff wins

The last couple of weeks of the girls soccer regular season have been a bit tough on Vernon Hills.

Part of that is because the Cougars have played some tough teams, in both Class 2A and 3A. The hardest part to accept was that they'd scored just 2 goals in six straight losses, including shutouts in the last four.

Those defeats were against Mundelein, Carmel, Glenbrook North, Deerfield, Libertyville and Evanston - quite a collection of high achievers.

Something had to change in a hurry for Vernon Hills to find postseason success, on on Tuesday, it did.

Fifth-seeded Vernon Hills rolled past No. 12 seed Resurrection 3-1 in a Class 2A regional semifinal on Tuesday night in Norridge.

Julia Neary knocked in a pair of goals for Vernon Hills, and Marley Reback had a goal and an assist.

"It's always nice, but we started sluggish and it was disappointing," Vernon Hills coach Mike McCaulou said. "We've struggled the last two weeks in the first five to 10 (minutes). Our energy level has been low. Our first half was very disappointing (against Resurrection). We need more of a team effort.

"The second half it was nice to see a couple players step up, and then we finally started to play our style of soccer, knocking the ball around and getting quality service. We need all of our players to get hungry. We need to go at players and make them commit. Our decision-making needs to be better.

Vernon Hills (6-10-2) will next play fourth-seeded Antioch (14-4-2) in the Ridgewood regional final at 5:45 p.m. Friday. Antioch got past host Ridgewood 7-0 in the other semifinal.

"If we don't come out on Friday right from the first whistle," said McCalou, "it could be a long game for us."

Resurrection (8-8) got on the board first on Tuesday as Jeslyn Dorband made the score 1-0 in the 14th minute.

The Cougars' Reback tied the game at 1-1 in the 24th minute. Then Neary took over with her 6th and 7th goals of the season. She took a feed from Ryan Schofield and was able to get a chip over the keeper and under the crossbar in the 59th minute for a 2-1 advantage.

"It was a great ball into to me," Neary said. "Then everyone was saying turn, so I figured I should do it. I knew there was no one in front of me, so I took a shot. The ball was bouncing and I was able to flick it in."

Neary added her second goal about five minutes later. After a pass from Reback, she worked her way through three Bandits defenders and broke free on a breakaway goal for the two-goal difference."

• Antioch got on a roll quickly and beat host Ridgewood 7-0 in their semifinal on Tuesday.

Rachel Moore found the back of the net four times, giving her 34 goals this spring.

Ella Roberts, Katlyn Holmes and Karly Monaco had the other goals for Antioch. Morgan Keefer and Roberts both had a pair of assists, Sarah Smith and Gabby Michaels had the others. Roberts has assisted on 23 goals this season.

Sequoits keeper Monica Wilhelm earned her 10th shutout with 2 stops.

"It was awesome, we had 4 goals in eight minutes," Antioch coach Marni Polakow said. "It's actually what a 4 seed should do against a 14th seed. We've been waiting four years for this game and we finally got an opening round that we deserve. We took care of business."