Hoffman rallies, ties York
Hoffman Estates fought back twice against host York Saturday afternoon, the second time on a superb goal from Lenin Roa to help the Hawks earn a 2-2 draw on the turf in a non-conference boys soccer match in Elmhurst.
The Hawks (2-2-1), who one day earlier dropped their Mid-Suburban West opener to Conant, were on the brink of dropping a second straight match when sophomore Luis Colin Vargas, an energetic and high octane playmaker, helped create the equalizer. Vargas produced some clever work on the ball to get himself involved in a quick combination with Kevin Castro to help find Roa on the right flank.
"We recently moved from a 4-4-2 to a 1-5-3 with Luis up top, and he's helped to make (that) change work for us because he's very unselfish and understanding of the tactical end of the game as well," said Hoffman coach Matt Sriver, who would watch the opening exchanges from both clubs to be tentative, as the two packed midfields took their time to test and observe each other.
The match sprang to life when an unfortunate piece of bad luck for the Hawks led to the Dukes (2-3-2) scoring the opening goal.
During what appeared to be a routine ball played back to Hawks keeper Michael Gordon from Michael Wnek, the junior backliner gave his pass a little too much pace for the unsuspecting Gordon, who, obviously, was unable to handle the ball to keep it from harm's way ... instead spraying the Wnek pass to the near post and to an opportunistic David Selvaggi.
The Dukes striker wasted little time in finishing past Gordon at 17 minutes.
The visitors would have trouble clearing a corner from the area shortly thereafter, and after Gordon turned around Selvaggi's shot, the senior would then stop the fiery senior who would get free in a 1-on-1 situation.
"We had some trouble sorting things out, but did much better in the second half in our own end," admitted Sriver.
The Hawks charged forward in the final minutes before intermission with the aforementioned all involved, as well as Nick Cardenas, Andres Pena, and 2009 goal-scoring leader Sishuh Zerihun all adding plenty of pace and energy.
The Dukes proved to be a tough bunch to penetrate while holding their 1-goal lead, staying tight and compact in its own end until Roa unloaded a blast from the right side to force keeper Carmine Sementa to save at the near post.
Perhaps buoyed by the Roa shot, the Hawks quickly drew even five minutes later to culminate another good stretch of soccer as Vargas finished neatly just inside the post.
An alert Wnek made a brilliant save with Gordon far off his line to challenge both Selvaggi and Maurice Watkins, who each hoped to get into the now open net vacated by the Hawks keeper.
Wnek would track back and head Selvaggi's shot, which appeared to give the Dukes the go-ahead goal at 61 minutes, but neither of the Hawks could stop Watkins 90 seconds later when he redirected a Selvaggi corner from the near flag.
"No. 10 (Selvaggi) and No. 20 (Watkins) were a load for us today, but when we play quick and use our skills the way we did on both goals, we can do very well for ourselves," Sriver would say.
The momentum swung back to the visitors and it wasn't long before Roa thumped his second goal of the season to highlight a wonderful sequnce between the junior midfielder with Vargas and Castro.
"We have to close out our opponents when we have the chance, and we didn't do that today," said York coach Markus Roy.