Geneva survives Streamwood's scare

Sometimes a team survives a big scare in its opening playoff game before going on a lengthy postseason run.

At least that's what the Geneva boys soccer team is hoping for after edging Streamwood 3-2 in a down-to-the-wire match in the Class 3A St. Charles East regional.

"We expected a tough contest against these guys and we knew they had a lot of offensive power," Geneva coach Ryan Estabrook said. "We're fortunate to come out with a win today. Streamwood played great out there today."

Geneva (17-4-2) once again fell behind, struggling to get anything going offensively. To make matters worse, Streamwood junior Ivan Arce lined a shot past goalkeeper Ryan Ward in the 33rd minute to give the Sabres a 1-0 lead at intermission.

"We were too concerned with starting well and not giving up an early goal," Estabrook said. "I think it's good to come out with a little nervous energy but we just kept building that up to the point that we were playing too anxious."

The 10-minute break between halves allowed the Vikings to regroup, compose themselves and play more like a 17-win team.

Seamus Kaminsky got Geneva even at 1-all with his goal at 36:38 in the second half. The Vikings then took their first lead with 28:55 remaining. Brady Wahl faked a shot before dribbling around left and centering a pass to Kevin Hilgart, who finished.

"We've been calling Kevin 'Big Government' because he keeps bailing us out," Estabrook said. "That was another time because we needed that goal really badly."

Streamwood wasn't ready to quit though, taking advantage of a Geneva defensive breakdown and making it 2-all on senior Alex Perez's goal off of Ward's hands at 24:52.

"I've told my guys all season that I don't care who we play or what the score is you've got to play hard for 80 minutes," Streamwood coach Matt Polovin said. "If you do, good things can happen and we had our chances to put it away and just couldn't."

Geneva could put it away and would with only a little more than 2 minutes remaining.

After a Hilgart shot deflected off a Sabres player, Robbie Johnson headed a picture perfect corner kick from Wahl for a score.

"It was a great ball by Brady," Johnson said. "I had the easy job because it was right in front of the net."

The scare was finally over.

"We thought we were going to blow by this team," Johnson said. "Obviously that didn't happen so I think it's kind of a wake up call for us."