Girls soccer: Warren savors unbeaten NSC finish
Warren's girls soccer team is still in celebration mode after clinching the North Suburban Conference championship last Thursday.
You can't blame them for extending that effort, especially with the way they received their league-clinching news.
On Thursday, the Blue Devils had defeated Waukegan but couldn't confirm their achievement until later, when they got results from other games involving Lake Zurich and Mundelein.
"It's a good feeling, and it's one of those goals that we set at the beginning of the season," Warren coach Ryan McCabe said. "It was anti-climatic the other day when we clinched and no one was around. So it was nice to get together with the girls on Friday to enjoy it a bit."
Warren went out and finished its NSC schedule with an unbeaten record on Monday by getting past visiting Stevenson 3-1.
The Blue Devils improved to 17-1-1 overrall and finished the NSC 6-0-1.
"Stevenson (4-8-2, 2-5) was a good team and their record was deceiving," McCabe said. "They played a lot of good teams and they played a lot of good teams well. They're a good team and we might see them next week (in a regional final). We definitely want to finish the regular season strong and don't want to look past anybody. We definitely want to build for next week."
Warren has two remaining regular-season road games - at Maine South on Thursday, and at Deerfield on Friday.
Stevenson has played many teams at a high level this season. In their five conference losses, four of them have been by 1 goal.
"Warren was a good team to play against - and tough to deal with their offensive attack," Stevenson coach Kevin Heffernan said. "I thought the girls played well and came back in the second half. We were holding the ball well in the midfield and we settled down. We had chances to score goals but we had problems putting the ball in the back of the net."
Ellen Szostak started the Blue Devils' scoring in the 27th minute with a volley kick set up by a cross from Lindsey Hardiman.
Warren increased its lead to 2-0 in the 42nd minute when Kaitlyn Chomko scored the first of her two goals after taking a pass from Lindsay Ditmars.
Stevenson recovered a bit, cutting the lead to 2-1 in the 56th minute. Jill Steinbrink sent a corner kick in front of the goal for Brianna Vanzanten, who directed a shot off the back heel into the goal.
"We do come from a lot of different clubs and most of us don't play together outside of high school," said Steinbrink, who will play soccer at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis next fall. "So its hard for us to combine, especially in the midfield, and this game we played a different system to combat (Warren's) offensive attack. When we get things to work, we're very good at keeping things at a high speed."
Chomko scored again (her 16th of the season) in the 59th minute, connecting on a shot that had deflected of a Patriots player for the 3-1 advantage.
Warren's defense has been sound all season long. In addition to Ditmars, the Devils have had reliable work from Maddie Gryzik, Natalie McNally, Rebecca Pineau, Jessica Dietzen and Kate Weyhich. Keeper Skylar Reilly had 2 saves.
"We're always there to pick up each other," said McNally who's also going to attend IUPUI. "We work well with each other on the back line, and there's a lot of communication."