St. Charles N. scores early, beats Barrington
Ninety seconds into Tuesday’s Class 3A Barrington supersectional, St. Charles North got a corner kick on the left wing and Kelly Manski went over to take the kick.
Surely Manski was going to kick it long into host Barrington’s penalty area. All season, the North Stars took their corner kicks long, although they aimed at different players’ heads. But always those kicks were whacked into the center of the penalty area.
Except this time the North Stars played the ball short — to Lauren Koehl. And then Koehl did what she’s made a habit of doing this season when she swiveled on the ball and sent it into the net at the right post.
That goal ended as the only of the match and the 1-0 victory means St. Charles North heads into Friday’s semifinals and a rematch with Downers Grove South.
“We’ve never played a short one before,” Koehl said. “This is kind of a one-time thing. It’s good that we executed it.”
Even St. Charles North coach Ruth Vostal admitted to the uniqueness of the play. Koehl found herself momentarily unmarked as she received the ball. By the time her defender was recovering, Koehl was in the process of dispatching the shot toward the goal.
“We have about four or five corner plays and there’s a couple that we go to more regularly,” Vostal said. “But with the wind, we talked about it in pregame. I said ‘let’s run just this one.’ We talked through it and made sure everyone knew what to do with it. Luckily it worked.”
St. Charles North (18-5-2) has twice qualified for the state finals. In 2004, the North Stars finished second while in 2010, the team finished third.
“We talk about it every year that there’s a potential to get there,” Vostal said. “Every coach knows that the road to get there is extremely hard. You look at the teams we’ve faced, the things that can happen, the calls that can be made. There’s so many things that have to line up perfectly.”
One factor impossible to overlook is St. Charles North’s defense, which has not allowed a goal in five postseason matches.
“I think our team defense has been amazing for these last five games,” Vostal said. “We’ve worked on that. We’ve tried to do a better job of our forwards pressuring and with everyone reading the play a little more. But you look and if a quality player gets by, there’s always two or three Blue people there to help out. So I’m proud of the effort.”
Barrington (19-6) had chances, none better than the free kick taken by Molly Pfeiffer 13 minutes into the match from 22 yards just to the right of the “D” at the top of the penalty area. Pfeiffer got the ball around the North Stars all but North Stars goalie Carly Dietrich made a diving save.
“I had to be a lot more on my toes,” Dietrich said. “I had a lot more action. They were coming hard and they wanted to score so bad. But our defense didn’t let up and I wanted to go to state so bad, so there was no letting up for us.”
One look at Barrington’s roster shows how youthful this year’s Fillies were. But through a season in which serious injuries took a number of players off the field or limited their effectiveness, the seven roster seniors kept the team headed in the right direction.
“It’s hard because of the type of kids that we lose,” Barrington coach Ryan Stengren said. “The character of this team is that they’ve overcome a ton of things.”
With its firepower and with the margin only one goal throughout the match, there was an expectation that Barrington would somehow find the net. After Pfeiffer’s chance, Barrington came close again late in the first half when Jenna Szczesny hit the post. Strong wing play from Aimee Pierce led to other chances, but the North Stars’ defense held firm for 80 minutes.
“The game of soccer’s weird like that,” Stengren said. “They score early and you think you’ve got plenty of time. And then you see the clock ticking down and ticking down and there you go, that’s it.”