Boys soccer: Round Lake edges Leyden
Every day is on the road again for Round Lake's boys soccer team. The Panthers have been "Road Warriors" without a home game all season because the school's sports facility with new field turf hasn't been fully completed.
It hasn't fazed Round Lake though, as the Panthers got past Leyden 3-2 in a nonconference match at Grayslake Central on Saturday afternoon.
The Panthers have put together another winning season at 12-1-4 and are the No. 3 seed in the upcoming Class 3A Libertyville sectional.
"Leyden comes from a pretty tough conference (West Suburban) and it's what we've been doing all year," Round Lake coach Hugo Perez said. "We win on the road. Even if it's a home game, it's still on the road no matter what, wherever we go. It's really important to my seniors for a home game, but it's more motivation for these guys to keep rolling. It's no home game for us and we just take it out on opponents that we don't have a home game."
Round Lake won the Northern Lake County Conference with a 8-0 victory over North Chicago on Friday night, a game that was played at Grayslake North The Panthers went unbeaten (5-0-2) in the conference.
"It's nice to win conference, but we're past that now," Tellez said. "Now, it's getting past the playoffs and for the teams that haven't done it here at Round Lake."
The Panthers had one last chance at a home game against Warren this Tuesday, but it was moved to Gurnee.
On Saturday, Round Lake jumped out to 2 early goals in the first half and added another before Leyden (10-7-1) came back with a couple of second half goals.
"The second half was a good half for us. First half we let up two early goals that were our mistakes," Leyden coach Mark Valintis said. "Credit (Round Lake), that's what makes them a good team. They punish you for the mistakes. Just proud with the way we came back in the second half and kept fighting. We pulled a couple back and it gave us a chance to maybe get the third one. But, we still feel pretty good about the second half."
The Eagles played without one of their starters, Alan Vasquez, who was out with an ankle injury.
Jesus Ramos opened the scoring in the ninth minute with an unassisted goal and then followed up with a second one three minutes later off a touch pass from Maqiis Haywood. He found the back of the net for a 2-0 Panthers advantage.
"The first one was off a volley and the second one was off a nice pass coming on a one-touch," said Ramos, who has 6 goals on the season. "Haywood gets two guys on him and pushes them aside and it leaves me with a run through."
Haywood scored his 10th goal this season to go along with 10 assists with a knock in the 48th minute off an assist from Ivan Guerrero to put Round Lake ahead 3-0.
The Eagles cut the lead to 3-1 in the 51st minute when Ozzie Pacheco scored off a pass from Chris Hernandez. Then, Dylan Santamaria added an unassisted goal that was deflected and found its way into the back of the net in the 77th minute.