Kfoury's early goal stands up against Redhawks

 

By Chris Walker
Photo courtesy of Bret Richter

You often hear high school coaches talk about the inability to convert on scoring opportunities, which makes particular sense in a sport like soccer, where scoring is at a premium.

While the finger is often pointed at a team's failings to find the back of the net, sometimes a closer look needs to be made at what the opposing team is doing to thwart one's scoring chances.

While a team might be creating opportunities, perhaps they aren't finishing because the defense is reacting just in the nick of time.

A case could be made for both the failure of Naperville Central's offense, as well as a strong performance by Glenbard North's defense and goalkeeper Eric Tenut during Tuesday's DuPage Valley Conference match in Carol Stream.

The Redhawks outshot the host Panthers, 16-4, but of those 20 shots only one found the back of the net, and it came off the foot of Glenbard North senior Alex Kfoury to give the Panthers a 1-0 victory in their final regular-season home game.

"We capitalized early and stayed strong, but the big thing was they had 16 shots on net," Kfoury said. "We stopped them all, so at the end of the day it was just really strong defense."

Kfoury's game-winner came with 36:26 remaining in the first half as the Panthers jumped on top early. Ryan Anderson worked to the left of the penalty box before feeding the ball toward Kfoury who blasted it past goalkeeper Zach Richter.

"We talked about coming out in the first 10-15 minutes and playing instead of just being back on our heels and that didn't work out so well for us," Naperville Central coach Troy Adams said. "We still cannot figure out a way to start a game with some intensity, and the seniors and captains need to take some of the leadership."

Pat Flynn, A.J. Seaman, Mike Plant and Jack Patrick all had shots on frame in the first half for the Redhawks, but all came away empty-handed.

It was much of the same for both squads in the second half with the Glenbard North defense continuing to stifle the Redhawks' scoring chances. The Panthers came away with two match-saving plays in the first five minutes of the second half.

Kevin Homa stole the ball near the penalty area just before a shot attempt while Tony Lumani chased down a rolling shot that was heading toward an unoccupied goal as Tenut had ranged outside of the penalty area. Lumani was just able to chase the shot down, booting it out of bounds to keep his team ahead 1-0.

"We changed our defense because we knew they'd come out hard and we wanted to play a more defensive game," Lumani said. "We just made sure that we weren't making any mistakes in back. I played sweeper and kept looking for through-ball angles and communication was big for us tonight."

More scoring chances were still to come for the Redhawks, but like they had earlier in the evening, they were extinguished before they forced the zero to be changed on the scoreboard at Weber Field.

Seaman presented Flynn with a nice look with only 4:10 remaining but it went for naught. The Redhawks had a corner kick soon after and when it looked like they might finally get one in, Glenbard North's Kevin Greiner snuck in and blocked a shot heading toward the right post to keep the Panthers ahead.

And even in the waning seconds, as the Redhawks tried desperately to tie the game, it was John Colucci and a swarm of his teammates who made sure the ball was blasted out of play as the last seconds ticked off the clock.

"We talked about putting away opportunities with quality chances but did not find a way to the back of the net," Adams said. "Ultimately, great teams find ways to score regardless of the situation and we're not there yet.

"We have one game to figure it out and then enter the (state) tournament so we still have some work to do."