Carmel 9, Libertyville 6

Carmel 9, Libertyville 6

Winning games with a single kick is nothing new. Austin Heinrichs has done it before.

He just hasn't done it in front of a crowd of about 5,000, and gotten tackled by deliriously happy teammates and fans afterward.

But that's what happened Friday night for the Carmel soccer player turned football hero.

With 1.5 seconds left in Carmel and Libertyville's "instant classic" Route 176 rivalry game, Heinrichs came out of an icing timeout and calmly nailed an 18-yard field goal to give the host Corsairs a 9-6 victory -- their first victory of the season.

Carmel, which was thumped by Morgan Park last week, improves to 1-1 on the season. Libertyville, which failed to get into the end zone, drops to 1-1.

"I've never had that big of a moment in soccer before," said Heinrichs, a senior who just became eligible for football this week. Because of conflicts with soccer, he missed last week's game since he hadn't yet logged the minimum 12 required practices. "This was definitely insane.

"Ever since I've been kicking field goals, I love doing it. It's just fun, and this is probably one of the coolest things I've ever done at Carmel."

Speaking of cool, Heinrichs said the timeout Libertyville took to ice him actually worked in his favor.

"I was out-of-my-head nervous at first," Heinrichs said. "I was just trying to keep calm and look like I was calm.

"The icing actually helped me a little bit. It gave me a chance to relax and think about what I was going to do. It really did help."

A controversial decision by the officials also probably helped Carmel a bit.

The Corsairs had gotten to the Libertyville 2-yard line after a huge 12-yard pickup by quarterback David Venegoni with about 30 seconds to play.

With Carmel out of time outs and time running out, Venegoni had to spike the ball on the next play to stop the clock. The clock stopped with 17.9 seconds left, but the officials put two more seconds back on the clock.

Those two seconds wound up giving Carmel just enough time to kick the winning field goal three plays later.

"It was not fair to put two seconds back on the clock in that situation," Libertyville coach Randy Kuceyeski said. "In that situation (with such little time left), you let the game play out. It's ridiculous to do that and put that back on the clock.

"It was a hard-fought game, though."

Libertyville had tied the game at 6-6 with 9:32 left in the fourth quarter when Alvaro Castro, another soccer player, hit his second field goal of the night, a 20-yarder.

He also nailed a 40-yard field goal in the third quarter to cut Libertyville's deficit to 6-3.

Carmel had scored just before halftime on a 1-yard quarterback sneak by David Venegoni, but the point-after kick was blocked.

"It was a great game if you like defense," Carmel coach Andy Bitto joked. "Our defense should be congratulated, though. They played great all night long."

Both teams did really.

"This (stinks) because we had chances to win," Libertyville senior running back Doug Houser said. "We're a good team, they're a good team and everybody played their hearts out and that's all that matters."