St. Charles East blanks Larkin
St. Charles East senior Renee Ruminski said Tuesday the team used first five games of the season as a learning experience.
The Saints put all those lessons to good use as they dominated Larkin for their first win of the season, a 7-0 rout at Memorial Field.
"One of our main goals has been to learn something from every game," Ruminski said. "We feel like we've really done that and built on every game. Finally things are starting to work together."
East (1-3-2, 1-0-0 Upstate Eight) started the scoring with 28:18 remaining in the first half, converting after the Larkin defense was unable to clear the ball out of its penalty area. After a couple of deflected shots, Caren Bieschke scored to the near post past Royals goalkeeper Anna Goodlove.
Eighty seconds later the Saints went up 2-0. Ruminski's shot hit the crossbar and Lauren Rohrmeier knocked in the rebound.
Kerry Savage made it 3-0 with 24:01 left, putting away a rebound off another shot from Ruminski. Ruminski finally found the back of the net 4 1/2 minutes later. Bieschke saved the ball near the Royals' endline and found Ruminski, who slotted a shot home from 6 yards out. Rohrmeier added her second goal of the game with 18:39 left in the opening half.
"We had a long meeting (Monday) night and talked about a lot of things," East coach Pat Feulner said. "Start of conference, new season, we said, 'Let's get after it.' "
Ruminski added 2 goals in the first 5 minutes of the second half to complete her hat trick and enforce the mercy rule, cutting more than 18 minutes off the second-half clock.
"It's finally good to get a win under our belt," Ruminski said.
The Royals (4-7-2) had a great scoring opportunity less than 2 minutes into the first half. Jacqulin Goodlove ran onto a Kelli Johnson long free kick, which deflected off an East defender's head. Goodlove had a breakaway, but Saints goalkeeper Zoie Samaan was able to get her feet on the ball and deflected it away as Goodlove tried to make a move at the top of the penalty area.
"We had one good chance," Royals coach Ken Hall said. "The keeper made a great save, kicked the ball away from her."