Bartlett tops Meadows for tourney title
The stingy defense the Bartlett girls soccer team had throughout the South Elgin Spring Break Tournament was evident in Friday's championship match as well.
The Hawks shutout Rolling Meadows and got a second-half goal from Jessica Consentino to capture the tournament title with a 1-0 victory at Millennium Field.
“We been staying tight on our marks and making sure we covering for each other,” Hawks coach Heather Thomas said. “If one gets beat, another defender was right there. They worked really well together.”
Bartlett (6-3) allowed just one goal in four games during the tournament. The Mustangs (5-3) controlled much of the play in the second half, but had just 4 shots on goal in the game.
Rolling Meadows thought it had taken a 1-0 lead as the first half buzzer sounded. Ann Marie Lynch fired a 35-yard shot over Hawks goalkeeper Natalia Grodzki's head. The shot hit the underside of the crossbar and bounced straight down as the buzzer sounded. Neither the referee nor the referee assistant on the sideline could tell if the bar bounced on the opposite of the goal line, but the referee pointed to the center circle, usually the signal of a goal. After a conference of the three officials, the referee waved off the goal.
“(The referee) said he couldn't see it and obviously couldn't call it a goal if he couldn't see it,” Mustangs coach Mike Drenth said. “There's a good chance it was in, but I get it. I was just questioning him because he pointed to the middle, which usually means a goal.”
The Hawks had better scoring opportunities in the first half, but didn't capitalize until there was 15:14 remaining in the second. With the ball on the near sideline, the ball was played toward the center. Nikki Norean dropped the ball back to Consentino, who curled a right-footed shot into the far corner of the goal for the only game of the match.
“We've worked really hard and really played as a team better in this tournament,” Cosentino said. “We've put everything that we've worked on in practice together. It's paid off.
Grodzki made 4 saves to earn the shutout. Ashley Ingolia had 5 saves, all in the first half, for the Mustangs.