St. Charles East surprises Wheaton North

When you score the only goal in a playoff opener on your home field against a team seeded higher than yours, you might be allowed a little post-match ego trip.

But Cat Camic wasn't having any glory hounding after her goal that gave the St. Charles East Saints a 1-0 victory over No. 6 seed Wheaton North at Norris Stadium on Tuesday evening in the semifinals of the Class 3A St. Charles East regional.

"I'm pretty much speechless," Camic said. "It was a great ball by Shaylee (Pedersen.) I have no idea how I got there, but I did. It's amazing, you know. We play in the final on Saturday and that's all we wanted."

The 11th-seeded Saints (8-8-3) advance with the victory to Saturday's regional title match against No. 3 Conant, which defeated Glenbard North earlier on Tuesday.

"This is a confidence booster," Camic said. "We've always been told 'you guys can go far.' This is our shot and we've got to take it."

In a match where neither team could claim much dominance over the other, Camic's goal with 94 seconds to play in the first half proved pivotal. Pedersen played the ball in from the right wing. Camic met the ball roughly 6 yards from goal in the center of the penalty area. Her shot went to the right and reached the side netting.

"I did (see the opening), but I have to say it was lucky," Camic said. "That's all we needed. I got it in."

At the other end, Wheaton North (10-12) was working the ball to its dangerous wing players - Kelsey Tharnstrom and Kate Wiegman. Getting a vital touch on a ball back in the middle of the penalty area proved elusive.

"I would say we both created an equal number of quality scoring chances in the game," Wheaton North coach Tim McEvilly said. "Their best chances came off restarts and their goal came off a restart. We got behind their defenders a lot. We had a lot of crosses but we couldn't find that one chance on one of those crosses."

The Falcons did have chances, however. Minutes before Camic scored, Rebekah Marquez had a free header in the penalty area but had her effort saved by Saints goalie Zoe Samaan.

"It was a tough game," Samaan said. "In the first half, we were dominating, but we were getting bombarded in the back. We weren't exactly playing our game yet. But I feel like the back four kept their cool. We played the whole 80 minutes."

But mostly, St. Charles East kept its back line intact. Late in the first half and early in the second, the Saints moved their midfield forward and the pressure seemed to make a difference in the quality chances created.

But as the second half progressed, the Saints worked to protect their slender lead. Samaan had to rush out to take the ball practically off Wiegman's toe with 20 minutes to play, the last solid chance the Falcons had to equalize in the match.

"Neither one of us is a goalscoring machine," McEvilly said. "That one goal made a major difference. With the few chances we had, we just didn't put the ball in the back of the net and they took advantage of their one quality opportunity."

Conant 3, Glenbard North 0: After dominating proceedings through much of the first half, it was only logical that Conant's players would feel a little frustration about being tied 0-0 with Glenbard North in the semifinals of the St. Charles East Class 3A Regional.

Yet the Cougars shook off any feelings of worry, took the lead in the first 10 minutes of the second half and went on to win 3-0. Conant (10-5-3) plays St. Charles East in Saturday's title game.

"I knew today was going to be one of those days, especially with the wind and with us playing on grass," Conant coach Jason Franco said. "This is our third game on grass this year and it's an adjustment process. You could see we were adjusting to the bad bumps and weren't in our rhythm."

Sam Armando curled the ball into the goal from 8 yards out for Conant's first goal. Alyssa Altoniso scored the Cougars other two goals - one along-range shot with 11 minutes left and the other a close-range shot after a well-worked free kick with 4 minutes to play.

Glenbard North (8-14-1) improved greatly over it 2009 performances this year, but was unable to unlock Conant on Tuesday.

"That was our problem today, possession," Glenbard North coach Dave Stanfield said. "We couldn't get hold of the ball long enough to build. That's it, really."