Wildcats fall 2-0 to high-energy Naperville Central
By Gary Larsen

 

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Now that Naperville Central has played Waubonsie Valley and Neuqua Valley, and gotten the result against each, there’s one more Naperville-area rivalry game that the Redhawks can’t wait to play.

And it’s the big one.

“Neuqua was one of the games this year that we’ve really been looking forward to,” Central’s Grace Orndorff said after her side’s 2-0 win over the Wildcats. “Now, we’re really excited for the North game.”

‘North’ is, of course, Naperville North, and the two DVC giants will square off for certain on May 3 in a conference showdown at Naperville North.

The two teams could potentially meet during the final stages of this year’s Naperville Invitational, but they’d first have to get past top-shelf competition in the toughest regular-season tournament in Illinois.

Saturday’s win over one of the state’s best teams in Neuqua Valley only boosted Central’s confidence, and coach Ed Watson is seeing his team begin to play to its potential.

“I’m really proud of the girls. We’ve been challenging them to be that team all the time and now we’ve put two games together where they’ve been the type of team we hoped they could be,” Watson said. “At some points in time we were waiting around for someone else to do the dirty work, and they’re realizing that they have to do the dirty work as a team.”

The box score shows that second-half goals from  Autumn Muckenhirn and Katherine Short provided the difference for Naperville Central (10-1-1) against Neuqua Valley (8-3-2), thanks to the hustle plays and two assists that Abby Joyce delivered.

But it was Central’s intensity for 80 minutes that contrasted the two teams.

“They had a lot more energy than we did and they definitely outplayed us,” said Neuqua Valley coach Joe Moreau, whose team went 1-1-1 in the past week, including a difficult win over Bartlett and a tie in a physical game against Geneva.

There’s talent all over the pitch at Neuqua Valley but talent isn’t always enough, especially against top competition.

“We’ve been coming out flat. You can’t wave a magic wand and say ‘play with energy’,” Moreau said. “We have a handful of players who are giving us the effort you need, but lately there’s been an overall lack of energy. Some of the kids aren’t buying into it right now.”

Neuqua had the wind at its back on its home field during Saturday’s first half, but Gianna Dal Pozzo’s wide head shot at the post was the only truly dangerous shot the Wildcats had through 40 minutes.

Neuqua junior Zoey Goralski was her usual high-energy, dangerous self but the Redhawks passed her off and had defenders waiting for her at every turn.

“We’ve worked on getting back and helping each other cover, if we get put down a player, and we’ve worked on passing and moving. Today, we put it all together,” Central defender Alyssa Angelo said.

Defenders Angelo, Orndorff,  Meredith Tunney,  Carly Franzese, and Sabrina Cisneros kept organized throughout, as four-year starting keeper Jill D’Amico posted her seventh shutout of the year and the first of her career against Neuqua Valley.

The last time Central beat Neuqua Valley was 2008. Last year’s Megan Oyster-led Wildcats won 6-2 over the Redhawks, and an Oyster freekick beat Central 1-0 the year before. “Boy, am I glad she’s gone,” Watson said.

Goralski, Dal Pozzo, and Sydney Tappin were prominent throughout the contest, but the Redhawks got solid team-wide performances on Saturday.

“What goes unnoticed in the box score is what center mids do in the air, and Meredith (McEniff) and Maddie (Thompson), especially today, were pretty good when it came to the ball in the air,” Watson said. “When they’re keeping the ball off of our back four and our back four can just work off of where’s the second ball, then I like how we look defensively.

“In our formation, those two defensive mids are the most important players in the formation. And I thought Meredith and Maddie were both very, very  good today.”

The game’s first goal came 49 minutes in, when Joyce fought for a ball deep on the left side and centered to Muckenhirn, who had the space to take a touch to her right inside the penalty area and send a missile to the upper ninety at the far post.  Neuqua keeper Hannah Parrish had no chance to save it.

“Both of their goals were well-struck,” Moreau said. “But on their first one, (Muckenhirn) was unmarked and had too much space. She hit that shot from ten yards out. I’m surprised Hannah was even able to get a hand on it.”

Joyce was at it again at 60 minutes, feeding a ball across from left to right that Short settled and then belted inside the far post from 16 yards out. “We found openings in the second half. Maybe the pitch and wind had something to do with that, but we’ll take it,” Watson said.

“It was so exciting,” Angelo said. “We held up pretty well in the first half against the wind, and the second half was totally different. We had momentum and we held the ball a lot better.”

The Redhawks have been good in the air in scoring their fair share of goals this season, so they were particularly happy to see two goals come from feet on Saturday.

“We’ve scored on a lot of headers lately so it was good for us to take those shots from far out today,” Orndorff said. “Sometimes we hesitate with those but today we were ready to take them.”

Down 2-0 with 20 minutes left to play, Neuqua Valley might have made things interesting with a goal that would have halved Central’s lead. But the Redhawks kept the pressure on and down the stretch. Time and again during the game’s final 10 minutes, Central sent balls to the corner that stayed in and died there, eating up valuable minutes on the clock.

Watson applauded his entire back line for its effort, credited D’Amico for a fine day’s work, “and our two center backs (Tunney and Angelo) played pretty well today,”  Watson said.

“Goralski is scary. We talked about it at practice yesterday – don’t be ashamed if she gets behind you, because in eighty minutes she’s going to. The other girls not with her had to get behind the ball so that when she turned, we had another person waiting for her. For the most part, we did that. She gave us a couple of scary moments but you’re going to get that from a kid as good as she is.”