Crystal Lake South outlasts Prairie Ridge for title
Shootouts have not gone Crystal Lake South’s way in recent years, but two senior captains changed all that and helped the host Gators edge Prairie Ridge 3-2 in a Class 3A regional title match in Crystal Lake Saturday.
By coach Brain Allen’s count, the CL South girls soccer team over the past three seasons had won only 2 of 13 matches that ended in a shootout. The top-seeded Gators left the door wide open for the third-seeded Wolves by missing their second and third shots from the mark.
However, Prairie Ridge’s third and fourth shooters also failed to capitalize, missing subsequent kicks that would have staked their team to the lead.
Finally, CL South senior quad-captain Emily Brunner stepped up. The fifth shooter for the Gators boomed the ball low and to the left. It caromed in off the foot of Prairie Ridge goalkeeper Whitney Whitehouse, who was leaning the other way.
“We had been fighting the whole time,” Brunner said. “Being the last shooter, I just had to finish it and get it in.”
CL South goalkeeper Elizabeth Quinn clinched the victory seconds later by diving to her right to make a two-handed snare of Maria Bear’s low liner.
“I’m strong to my right side, so I try to always dive to my right,” Quinn said. “I just decided to go for it, to go right. Thank goodness she went there.”
With the match suddenly over, Quinn jumped to her feet, sprinted toward midfield and was mobbed by Brunner and the rest of her teammates.
“I couldn’t be happier than for two of our senior stalwarts in Quinny and Ellen to ice the deal,” CL South coach Brian Allen said. “That was fantastic. It was so deserving for Ellen to get the goal and then for Quinny to come up with a big save when she needed it after a so-so game. I was so happy for her.”
The regional championship is the first for the CL South girls soccer program since its Class AA title in 2004. Crystal Lake South (17-7-2) advances to Tuesday’s Jacobs sectional semifinal match against NIC-10 co-champion Hononegah (18-1-2), which defeated Boylan Catholic 2-1 on Friday.
“They never cease to amaze me,” Allen said of his players. ‘This year has been a roller coaster. We talked about the journey through good times and bad times, and what I was most proud of was we handled a lot of adversity. We fell behind early uncharacteristically, came back and got the lead.”
Prairie Ridge (6-13-10) took the lead less that seven minutes into the contest when Bear chipped a header lightly over the head of Quinn, who watched as the ball bounced into the net.
The Gators knotted the score 70 seconds later. Senior forward Kali Loescher was awarded a penalty kick and her shot to the top-left corner went in, though Whiteside got a hand on it.
Loescher gave the Gators a 2-1 lead on her 21st goal of the season with 21:25 left in the first half. She made a running slide and buried a one-timer on a cross from junior Marcella Albuquerque.
“(Albuquerque) just got open in the middle,” Loescher said. “I called for it through, and she passed it. It was amazing.”
The Wolves tied the match in the waning minutes of the first half when Christa Lehman was awarded a penalty kick to the dismay of Allen, who objected but stopped short of being carded.
Neither team scored in the second half or four 10-minute overtime periods, though Prairie Ridge sophomore Jessica Flores’ shot with 17 seconds left in regulation narrowly slid wide of the left post.
“I think we could have played until Sunday and I don’t think anyone was going to score,” said retiring Prairie Ridge coach David O’Leary.