Ozbay leads Barrington to title

For about 77 minutes, the scoreboard didn't change in Barrington as it hosted Conant in a Mid-Suburban West boys soccer match.

It simply read 0-0.

That hardly meant that nothing was going on Thursday. Both sides fought hard and the game was full of action. But neither side found a big enough hole in the opposing defense to make anything happen.

Until the 76th minute.

With just more than three minutes to play, Matt Beightol sent in a corner kick for the Broncos that Ryan Nolan headed straight up into the air right in front of the Cougars' goal.

Ata Ozbay then got under it and with his header, the ball went into the left side of the net past Conant keeper Scott Majercik.

Barrington (15-1, 9-0) then held on for the 1-0 win and clinched the West title.

"I'm jacked up, it means a lot for us to win tonight," said Barrington coach Scott Steib. "Our guys played well tonight. This is only the third divisional title for Barrington in 33 years. We're very happy about that."

The big play for Ozbay almost never happened -- literally. The junior forward nearly sat out the game to nurse a pulled muscle.

"I was in the right place at the right time," Ozbay said. "I'm glad it was me -- I almost didn't play today. It was a battle."

Ozbay's goal was also made possible by goalie Jack Deroche, who made 4 saves in his fifth shutout of the season.

"It was finally a good game, a game I can feel good about," Deroche said. "It was a complete (team) game."

The Broncos maintained some of their momentum on the energized play of Cameron Reilly and Francesco Furio.

"It was a hard-fought game," Steib said. "There'd be a chance at one end, then a chance five seconds later at the other end. It was really end-to-end."

For the Cougars (10-5, 6-3), Eric Marofske had a great game with control and multiple shots on goal.

"I think (Barrington) has a lot more skill than they give (themselves) credit for," said Conant coach Tony Kees. "We did a good job of defending restarts all night until one play. We went toe-to-toe with a hard-working team."

Conant held some strong momentum several times, including the first 10 minutes of the second half where 2 great shots resulted in 2 great saves by Deroche.

Wheeling 4, Elk Grove 0: Wheeling shocked host Elk Grove with 2 late goals before intermission and went on to a 4-0 win Thursday night to regain the pole position in the race for the MSL East title and a spot in the next week's Soccer Bowl.

After a scoreless 36-plus minutes, the Wildcats (11-9, 5-4, 10 pts.) were rampant and scored twice in four minutes to take the lead on the Grens (4-10-1, 2-6).

"Your always concerned your guys are going to look past your opponent when it's homecoming week and we have a match (tomorrow) against our long-time rival Buffalo Grove," said Wheeling coach Ed Uhrik. "But everyone kept their focus at the task at hand to help us get a big win tonight."

The victory moves the Wildcats 2 points ahead of idle Hersey (10-8) with each side having two matches left in the regular season.

"We can't worry about who we're playing, because we're just looking for positive results right now," said Wildcats striker Joel Del Toro, who was involved in 3 of the 4 goals.

"Both (Del Toro) and No. 22 (Leo Elizalde) worked so hard to create and were a lot of fun to watch, but not for us," said Grens coach Joe Bush.

The dynamic junior duo linked well with each other, in addition to mates Trevor Rubin, Didher Machado and Abraham Soto in the first half hour. But they all failed to find the back of the net, thanks in part to a couple of fine saves by Grens keeper Andy Larson, as well as the visitors inability to be as sharp as needed in close.

The run of play never evened out until the final 10 minutes of the first half when the Grens were able to possess and play through the middle and generate a few chances. The best came late when Leif Lundgren's missile was pulled out of the air by Wildcats keeper Tom Luna.

"That save, and one towards the end of the match were real confidence-boosting stops for Tom," said Uhrik.

Junior Dan Hehn would beat Larson to a ball sent over the top from Jesse Astudillo at 36 minutes and use just a hint of a touch to send the ball rolling into the back of the net.

Four minutes later, the Wildcats would celebrate the first of 2 spectacular strikes when Elizalde unloaded a left-footed blast which rattled the far right inside netting.

Del Toro would record his second helper of the match after teammate Sanjit Shah's well-timed tackle in the middle initiated the Wildcats third goal, which Rubin completed with a wicked cracker from 25 yards.

Devilish trickery by Del Toro and Elizalde up the left flank allowed Machado to strike his team-leading 11th goal at 71 minutes.

-- Mike Garofola

Buffalo Grove 3, Prospect 1: Joe Colmone had an early goal for visiting Prospect in its MSL East contest.

But Paul Clementi's first-half goal helped keep the Bison level going into the intermission.

Danny Ontidero's second-half goal assisted by Ryan Olson gave BG the lead for good. Frank Atchison set up Clementi's second goal.

Fremd 1, Hoffman 0, OT: Michael Ballschmiede broke through for the Vikings off Matthew Leonard's assist to secure the MSL West win. Hawks keeper Sebastian Kieruzal made 3 saves.

Streamwood 1, Larkin 0: Streamwood (10-10-1, 4-3) picked up its second straight tough Upstate Eight Conference match and a third consecutive win with this 1-0 shutout over Larkin.

The Sabres record their third straight shutout with Alex Perez (6 saves) in goal for as many games.

Roma Patino scored the lone goal of the game assisted by Brian Magana.

"Larkin has a nice team," said Streamwood coach Matt Polovin. "They played aggressive and go hard, but I felt that we took them out of their game. We frustrated them."

Raziel Somarriba was in goal for the Royals collecting 5 saves. Larkin missed on a PK and could not convert on opportunities.

"We played hard, but couldn't put the ball into the net," said Larkin coach Ken Hall.