Round Lake stuns CL South again
Playing under the brightest spotlight in program history, Round Lake continued to shine Thursday night.
The Panthers (16-3-5) defeated No. 1 seed Crystal Lake South for the second time this season with a 2-0 victory to book their place in the finals Saturday against Rockford Boylan, which beat Larkin 3-2 in penalty kicks in the first match of the evening at the Barrington sectional venue.
“We're not a team, but a family, and when we train, we train together, and when we win (or) lose, we do it as a family,” said Panthers coach Hugo Tellez.
“This group is coming together at the right time of the season, and tonight we overcame a tough start to win against a very good from Crystal Lake South.”
Both clubs played frantic in the opening stages, but especially the eventual victors who watched all-state candidate Charlie Oliver (28 goals) break free from a trio of defenders off the opening whistle and nearly strike a goal in record time for the Gators.
Minutes later, Oliver was at it again, this time after Alex Tapia sent the junior through and if not an act of heroism from Panthers keeper Luis Leon the Gators (21-2-2) would have surely grabbed the lead just eight minutes into the match.
“We played so nervous at the start of the match, but after we finally settled down, then got that first goal, we began to play the way we all know that we can,” said Panthers leading scorer Jordi Rubio.
Rubio put his club in front at 37 minutes when the assistant referee thought he saw Mauricio Salgado brought down inside the box, and moments later Rubio convert his spot-kick to send his club into the break with a 1-goal lead.
“The PK call, I am not too sure about, but it is what it is, but two mistakes led to both goals, and this entire match became a case of deja vu all over again for my guys,” said Gators coach Brian Allen, who earlier in the season watched his lads drop their only match of the regular season 1-0 to the Panthers.
The NSC runners-up enjoyed the run of play after the break, except for a dangerous opportunity created by Tapia to Oliver off the counter, and if not for a hard tackle by Jimmy Avila, Oliver could have been in on Leon.
With the Panthers' backline of Avila, Abraham Valadez and Jose Garcia keeping all of the play in front of them and connecting with the midfield, which did well in winning most of the 50-50 balls coming there way, the Gators were unable to get anything going forward searching for the equalizer.
Rubio struck his 29th of the season at 74 minutes when he deftly went up and over Gators keeper David Walsh.
“I said beforehand that we needed to do the little things in our game plan to be successful, and we just didn't accomplish that tonight,” said Allen.
The Panthers have now played one match longer than ever in their history and will have a chance to stay alive one more day against the 21-1-3 Titans whose only defeat came in this same stadium 2-0 in the championship match of the Barrington Classic tournament on Labor Day weekend.