Another milestone as Maine West blanks St. Patrick
The Maine West soccer team warmed the hearts of a chilled Senior Day audience with a 5-0 nonconference victory over St. Patrick on Tuesday afternoon in Des Plaines.
A 4-goal second-half explosion by the hosts helped end the regulation season for the Warriors (15-4-2), who last week clinched a Central Suburban North division title, its first since 1978, while setting a record for the best record in school history.
"It's been (all) about working hard, and wanting to get better each time we train or play a match," said senior Pat Pliszka, who has led a rebuilt backline in front of keeper Mike Bednarz to 10 shutouts, including a 1-0 victory over state ranked and CSL power Deerfield two weeks ago.
"That win over Deerfield was an eye-opener for a lot of us, and it showed that we could compete and do well against top level teams."
An undermanned St. Patrick (5-12-4) arrived with just 13 able bodies dressed, and it lost the services of junior Christopher Aylward along the backline for a spell due to a wrist injury, which only made matters worse for the Shamrocks.
With the Warriors' stadium turf deemed unplayable for this annual nonconference contest, the match was moved to a postage stamp-sized side field on the outskirts of the school, which in the early going proved beneficial to the visitors who were able to pack things in and shrink an already small playing area.
"We made it easy for Pat's to defend in the first half because we forced everything into the middle," said Maine West coach Mike Divincenzo, "and that's why we didn't really produce very many quality chances."
Anes Kadiric finally made the breakthrough Divincenzo was looking for when the senior finished the work of the architects Carlos Trejo and Nick Stanfa at 10 minutes when his shot went off of keeper Michael Graf.
The Warriors double their lead just after intermission when a ball sent out of the back found Oscar Gomez, who quickly connected with captain Angel Herrera.
Warriors leading scorer Ryan Ybarra struck for his 11th goal of the season at 51 minutes with a low drive when he timed his run to beat an off-sides trap and ran onto a superb ball sent through from Herrera.
Maine West added more misery for the Shamrocks when an unmarked Pliszka thumped a header past Graf on a superb crossfield serve from Austin O'Toole on the left side.
"Now we get a chance to rest and get healthy in preparation of our regional opener next Wednesday against either (St. Pat's) or Prosser," said Divincenzo, who was without one of his captains, senior Cody Uidl, who suffered a knee injury last week.
Emmett Turner-Jackson eluded his mark near the endline before his blast bounded off the far post and into the back of the net in the 79th minute to end the scoring.