Irving Eloiza, Buffalo Grove deliver a title
Irving Eloiza and Buffalo Grove received a golden opportunity Saturday.
Highland Park keeper Justin Ozodor committed a hard foul inside the box and received a red card and disqualification that gave Elioza a penalty kick 10 minutes into the match.
He delivered, staking the sixth-seeded Bison to a lead they never relinquished en route to a 4-0 victory over the No. 3 Giants (17-4-1) in the Class 3A Hoffman Estates regional title match.
The victory sends the Bison into this week’s Palatine sectional semifinals, where they will play either No. 1 Prospect (19-0-2) or No. 8 Stevenson (12-4-3).
Eloiza then doubled the Bison lead at 15 minutes with a thunderbolt free kick.
“This may have been our best overall effort of the season, from front-to-back,” said Bison coach Rick Carlson. “We knew Highland Park has some very talented players, including their keeper, who has so much athletic ability and would be one of the best we would see all season. But there is no doubt that his foul and red card were crucial and easily the turning point of the game just 10 minutes into the match.”
“I know Justin from club, and he’s an amazing keeper, so when he went out it was huge for us and also for them,” said the junior Eloiza, who unleashed a devasting missile from 30 yards to beat backup keeper Jesus Nava.
Nava had a rough night in relief for the Central Suburban champion Giants, who had a difficult time with Eloiza’s pace and distribution as well as his ability to break down the defense on the dribble. The Bison also enjoyed air dominance supplied by MF Markus Fiordaliso and a backline that kept the Giants’ attack stalled.
“We knew coming in that we had to neutralize both Andrew and Michael Chang (both club players until this season) and to control the middle, and even when we went into the break coach reminded all of us that we didn’t win anything yet and to play as if it were 0-0 and not 2-0,” Fiordaliso said.
The Giants tried to mount a comeback, but the Bison backline of Matt Bloom, Eric Kotlyar and Julian Ramirez handled all sorts of pressure in front of keeper Nick Landsberger from the Chang brothers and Francisco Moore and Oscar Pozo.
“We’ve played this well on several occasions this year but made a mistake here and there and have paid for it,” Carlson said. “But tonight, we were excellent in all phases and never had a letdown, and that’s how you win a big game like this against a quality opponent.”
The Giants made a run following intermission, but the Bison slowly regained control and tested the HP defense with a couple of well-aimed flip throws from Alex Maciopinto.
Demo Drakoulis erased any chance for a Giants comeback when he redirected the ball past a sprawling Nava, who was on the ground after Alberto Eloyza’s inward swinging corner at 63 minutes.
In the 69th minute, a well-played 1-2 combination between freshman Zach Masciopinto and Luis Marquez culminated in Marquez’s goal from 14 yards.