Fairbanks' goal gives Cougars 3rd straight win
By Dave Miller

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Conant gave away a goal, but Glenbard East handed one right back.

Conant survived a surprising exchange late in the game to edge Glenbard East 2-1 in the final round of Lake Park’s Hillner Classic on a wet Saturday afternoon in Roselle.

Blake Fairbanks delivered the game-winner when his seemingly harmless header off Giovanny Rocha’s throw-in snuck under Glenbard East goalkeeper Seth Quam for the go-ahead goal in the 66th minute.

“I wasn’t expecting it,” said Fairbanks of his first score of the season. “I headed it across and the goaltender let it in for me. It had some speed on it, but I was kind of surprised it went in.”

Fairbanks called Rocha’s throw from the left sideline “perfect.”

“Our set pieces have kind of been our strength this year,” Conant coach Jason Franco said. “We’ll take it. These are the kind of games we’re going to have to win.”

Glenbard East (1-4-0) had tied the game two minutes earlier on a fluke goal of its own. Eduardo Diaz’s shot from a sharp angle on the far right side looked non-threatening enough – until the ball squirted by Conant goalkeeper Patryk Openchowski and Hugo Aguilar kicked it into the net.      

“I got lucky and scored, but a goal’s a goal,” Aguilar said about his third tally of the tournament.

Glenbard East’s good fortunate turned out to be short-lived.

“We got the break that we needed to get ourselves back into the game and…it’s just frustrating, very frustrating right now,” Rams coach Josh Adler said.

The irony is Quam kept Glenbard East in the match with his goalkeeping. He made 13 saves in the contest as Conant (3-1-0) pressured him steadily throughout the contest.

Adler lauded Quam’s recent play, but would like to see his teammates take some pressure off him.

“Unfortunately, you don’t want it always to have to come down to your keeper,” Adler said. “He’s been big. He’s going to have to be big this year and then it’s just going to be up to us to find ways to score and create some more opportunities. We’re just not getting enough opportunities going forward right now.”

Conant generated plenty of scoring opportunities in the first half, but only had one goal to show for it. That came in the 29th minute when Victor Moska flicked Rocha’s throw-in to the front of the net to the left side to Zach Thielbar, who tucked the ball inside the near post for his first goal of the season and a 1-0 lead for the Cougars.

“That’s how you draw it up,” Franco said.

Adler was not happy that both Conant goals came off throw-ins.

“My guys didn’t show up prepared to play,” Adler said. “We told them we can’t give up restarts for them and both goals were throw-ins in the final third. It’s just execution of a game plan and we didn’t do a good job of that.”

It was the third win in a row for the Cougars, who finished 3-1 in the tournament behind all-tourney selections Curtis King, Openchowski, Justin Pydo, Kevin Quinn and Rocha.
 
“We had been struggling the last couple games,” Franco said. “Even though we won we didn’t play well. I thought we played pretty well this afternoon. Overall, from top to bottom, I thought it was a pretty good effort. Glenbard East isn’t a bad squad. They beat Lake Park the other day and we expected a battle, and it was.

“I thought our center-mids, the combination of Blake Fairbanks, Pydo and Vic (Moskal) did a nice job of locking it down in there, and then our backs did a nice job. Quinn’s been a rock back there. Even though he’s a little guy, he does a lot of stuff for us.”

Aguilar, Miguel Godoy and Quam received all-tourney honors for Glenbard East, which went 1-3 in the event.

“It’s not the way you wanted to finish the tournament,” Adler said. “I would’ve liked to have gotten two wins here in a row, but we’re learning a lot. One of our big emphases is that we’ve got to try to be a fast-playing team. We’ve got to play in and out, off guys quickly and look for the next guy. If we sit on a ball too long it’s giving them an opportunity to get organized and it’s also giving them the opportunity to push someone else off the play."