Girls soccer: Metea Valley wins fifth consecutive regional championship

It's not the team motto, but Metea Valley has certainly made it a habit to "Play for May."

Senior Maeve Riordan scored twice early in the first half during Friday's Class 3A Metea Valley regional championship game against Plainfield South and that proved to be all the Mustangs needed to earn a 2-0 victory.

The Mustangs (14-7-3) advance to Tuesday's Plainfield North sectional semifinal to face familiar foe Neuqua Valley, which beat them twice earlier this year.

"It's been the goal the whole season to play our best in May," Riordan said. "It's what we've been training for during conference and nonconference games. All of it has been building up to this."

This was the fifth straight regional championship for the Mustangs.

"It becomes the expectation that we win a regional title," Mustangs coach Chris Whaley said. "Some years you're playing against Waubonsie Valley or another conference rival and now it's a game against an opponent you don't know really well, and they played hard, but we also came out with a lot of energy at the start and set the tone."

Plainfield South (15-6) fielded a team with 14 seniors and what coach Alfonso Lopez called, "the best finish ever" at the school.

"We knew ahead of time that Metea was a great team and is one of the top ones in the state every year," he said. "They scored two quick goals and we didn't have many chances."

Lauryn Wesoloski got the Mustangs started, dribbling up the field and touching a soft pass to Riordan, who buried her shot with 29:42 left in the first half.

"Lauryn was able to get the ball on the ground across the box and there was a defender between me and the goal," Riordan said. "I was able to turn almost around, make a nice angle for myself and place it in the opposite corner."

Riordan connected again with 26:25 remaining in the first half after Chesney Wargo lofted a pass her way.

"I know Maeve is always in the box and ready to get the ball," Wargo said. "I figured if I sent it in she'd be there to get it and that's really all that I did."

It was more than enough scoring for the Mustangs as the back line of Paige Buranosky, Nicole Dawson, Sarah Davies and Kaiya Hansen did their part in protecting goalkeeper Nikki Coryell during the few occasions that the Cougars challenged.

"We warned the girls at halftime that they're not going to go down without a fight," Whaley said. "We did a pretty job of controlling the ball, and there were not a ton of chances on either side, but the ones that were there we're limited and that was a testament to us controlling the ball."