Boys soccer: Naperville Central learns lesson from last season

Last year No. 15 seed Plainfield Central stunned No. 2 seed Naperville Central in a boys soccer regional semifinal.

The Redhawks once again earned a No. 2 seed, but this time they prevailed, beating No. 15 Bolingbrook 1-0 during Tuesday's Class 3A Naperville Central regional semifinal.

"You can learn lessons from the past," Redhawks coach Troy Adams said. "There is no entitlement. There is no, we're the No. 1 seed we need to advance right now. Everyone is in the same boat. We're all 0-0 and you never know, every game can be your last."

Naperville Central (13-4-3) dominated Bolingbrook but never could pull away. While the Redhawks struggled offensively to build their lead they also did the next best thing to protecting it by not allowing the Raiders to create any offensive threats.

"We put ourselves in position to score goals but couldn't score goals," Adams said. "And I've said we have some very nice players. We have some players that do some nice things, but we haven't had someone who has consistently put the ball in the net and that's a struggle when you don't have one or two guys who can consistently (do that), so you're in trouble."

The Redhawks struck early and made it hold up. Rohan Bhargava's corner kick with 34:26 remaining in the first half found the head of Nate Zain, who redirected it past goalkeeper Oscar Leon.

"It was placed perfectly to my head, right where coach wants to place a corner kick," Zain said. "I just finished my chance. It was like a wide-open net. It was an easy goal."

Bhargava confirmed that some extra practice recently on restarts proved helpful.

"We worked on restarts last weekend because we know in the playoffs you've got to get goals any way you can," he said. "Restarts is a great way to get them, so I looked for that spot and Nate finished it well."

Ryan Coleman, Ivan Dosen, Zack Kokes and Rokas Stadalninkas were a handful of the Naperville Central players who nearly added to their lead but saw their shots just elude the goal or get denied by Leon.

Fortunately, they weren't needed since the Redhawks defense proved impenetrable.

"Our defense played really solid tonight," Zain said. "Cam (Strong) and Tanner (Greenhagen) are both really good center backs and they held it down well by not letting them get turned facing our goal. That was probably the biggest plus for us."

Now, they live for another game.

"It's all about advancing," Adams said. "We'll keep working on getting better, but some games you just have to gut out."