Jacobs has a shot at title

The seventh minute of each half was the critical time for Jacobs' boys soccer team Tuesday.

Luis Cabral scored 6 minutes into the first half and, 40 minutes later, Brian Obmalay scored an insurance goal as the Golden Eagles defeated Round Lake 2-0 in the semifinals of the Class 3A Boylan sectional in Rockford.

The Eagles will play for the sectional title at 6 p.m. Saturday against host Boylan, which beat Barrington 2-1 in Tuesday's other semifinal.

The Panthers (17-4-1) played most of the first half in Jacobs' end, but a single run was all the Eagles needed to grab an early lead.

Cabral raced up the left side, veered toward the middle, and fired a shot that caromed off Panthers' goalkeeper Jose Landa and into the net.

Danny Trevor was outstanding in goal for Jacobs (14-7-4). He also got some help, as when Andres Gomez had an open shot but missed just wide left midway through the first half.

"They were just making some great runs, and we weren't used to that," said Trevor. "But our defense deserves a lot of credit. They shut down (Cesar Garcia), who we knew before the game was going to be a big threat."

The Panthers felt they had the edge in every statistic except the one that matters.

"We dominated the game as far as possession, shots, attacks, threats, but we had a couple of defensive mistakes and they got 2 goals off of it," said Round Lake coach Mike Hruska. "And then they hung us out. You've got to give them credit for surviving."

Jacobs coach Jim Dzialo didn't necessarily disagree.

"Because they're such a skilled team, we found ourselves doing a lot of defending," he said. "We were just sitting back and being patient with their skill. Let them make a bad touch and try to break it up.

"They're a good team in the sense that they put a lot of pressure on us. We couldn't possess it like we normally do."

The Eagles caught a break early in the second half. As the Eagles dumped the ball into the Panthers' end, Landa came up to the edge of the box to wait for it. Somehow, the ball skipped past him and toward Obmalay in the deep left corner. Obmalay had only to direct it into the open net.

The Panthers continued to put the pressure on, but couldn't bury one. Garcia clanged a free kick off the crossbar and just missed wide on a header. Trevor made a save on a Garcia breakaway, and also stopped a shot by Jordi Rubio.

"We came out and just did a lot of defending the last 20 minutes," Dzialo said.