Girls soccer: Fremd wins classic over Barrington, advances to 3A supersectional

Some sectional finals have everything — and was one of them.

Gary Scholz Stadium was the stage for the fourth meeting of the season between MSL powers Barrington and Fremd, and two terrific clubs did not disappoint the big crowd on this warm and humid night.

It went all the way to penalties, for the second consecutive time, and on this night Fremd would prevail, 4-3 in kicks to claim a 1-0 victory. The Vikings advance to play Warren (14-4-2) at the Class 3A Barrington supersectional Tuesday evening.

"This was a big one tonight, one in which we could have been up 2, or 3-0 if not for an unbelievable game from their keeper (Dominique Klujian) who was a major factor in this game, and almost led them to a win," said Vikings coach Steve Keller.

The Fillies won the MSL Soccer Cup in penalties over the Vikings, lost 1-0 two weeks ago, and defeated their longtime rivals 2-1 back in April.

Keller surprised the Vikings faithful when he moved senior Lily Mayer between the sticks when 100 minutes of pulsating soccer would not settle this contest, and the flag football and basketball star make three saves to offset the two that Klujian made to preserve the victory.

"I took a couple of shots in practice this week, but I was a little surprised when (Keller) told me to go in for the shootout," said Mayer.

"I missed my own spot-kick, so it felt great to be able to help our team with those saves."

In this end-to-end encounter at times there would be just a few clear-cut chances during this three-hour affair. Most of those came from the Vikings (16-6-1) who watched Klujian turn around a 30-yard blast from Gwen Zimmerman in the 14th minute, before a double save on Zimmerman, then Sami Serpico from just inside the spot during the first ten-minute extra session.

"With Gwen and Sami, we know if we can find them in the run of play, we always have a chance to score a couple of goals in any game," said senior Gia Gillespie.

"We created some chances, but their keeper was fantastic, and it was their energy and work rate that turned this game into a hard-fought 100 minutes.“

Gillespie would bury the game-winning spot kick in the sixth round of sudden victory after teammates Zimmerman, Serpico and Sophia Kennedy all converted.

Lauren Cobb, Maddie Martin-Johnston and Jazlyn Fertig were all perfect in their attempts.

"We were overachievers all season long, and truly maxed out our potential. And tonight, we put ourselves in position to win but just fell short, so congratulations to Steve and his girls," said Barrington coach Ryan Stengren, whose club finished at 18-4-1.

"After losing so many players to graduation from a year ago, there were not too many who felt we would get this far. But we were co-champs at the Naperville Invite, won our 14th straight MSL title, and almost got ourselves into the supersectionals, so right now I am very proud of this team."