Chicagoland Soccer

Warriors win in a shootout over rival St. Francis

By Gary Larsen

The stage was set. The best girls’ soccer team yet to come through St. Francis played hard, skilled, cohesive soccer and was closer than ever to earning the first win in program history over its local nemesis.

But the Big Dog wasn’t having it.

Defending 2A state champion Wheaton Academy battled through the sluggishness of a third game in three days, and kept its 10-season unbeaten streak against the Spartans intact.

After keeper Emily Mulder made the lone save of a shootout, Sydney Sharkey converted the shootout goal that gave the Warriors a 2-1 win over St. Francis, in a game played on the expansive artificial pitch at Elmhurst College.

Crystal Thomas scored the Warriors lone goal in regulation, against a Spartans team that brought the heat.

“I thought they did a good job. They came out pumped up, a lot of our girls know their players, and it’s a big, big rivalry for us,” Mulder said of St. Francis. “I don’t know if we brought everything we had but we played well, and they have some solid players.”

“We’re looking forward to playing them again, and hopefully we’ll bring everything we’ve got and be ready for it.”

There’s a good chance that Thursday’s battle stood as a preview of a sectional title game to be played on May 28. Wheaton Academy is the No. 1 seed of the Elmwood Park sectional, and St. Francis is seeded second.

The win gave Wheaton Academy the Suburban Christian Conference title in its first year competing in the new conference. The Warriors (14-3-1, 9-0 in SCC play) dominated the Private School League for years in both boys’ and girls’ soccer before joining the newly-formed SCC.

If Thursday’s game was any indication, what fans from both sides saw in Elmhurst was the birth of an intense conference rivalry.

“They’re always such a strong team,” St. Francis senior Meagan Gitchell said. “(Crystal Thomas) is very strong, Alexa (Sharkey) is always strong, and so is Christi (Dithrich). They always play hard, they play quick, and we have to hold down the midfield as much as we can against them.”

Through 40 minutes, the Warriors fought to find the gear to match the Spartans. Wheaton Academy coach Scott Marksberry was quick to tip his hat to St. Francis, but would have liked to see his girls play better on Thursday.

“I guess it would be fair to say that we were a little flat coming into the game today. Our warm-ups showed that,” Marksberry said. “In fact, our bus ride over was flat, our warm-up was flat, and it carried over into the game.

We were fortunate to have the wind at our back in the first half so we could work our way into the game. In the second half we played better but still, we just kind of held on.”

The Warriors scored their goal in the 35th minute when Thomas bent a free kick under the crossbar. The sophomore played the shot like a golfer teeing off into a crazy crosswind.

“My coach told me that with the wind, it’s going to curve,” Thomas said. “So I knew if I kit it above the keeper’s hands that it would bend right in. The wind grabbed it and I was like ‘go!’”

St. Francis (11-8-1, 6-2 in SCC play) knotted the score in the second half when Gitchell located a ball in a crowd near the goalmouth and buried it in the game’s 57th minute.

“I deflected it, a girl was coming in, my center back cleared it away and it came back in, and it was a far left shot that I wasn’t expecting and I couldn’t get my hand extended enough,” Mulder said.

Mulder made no excuses but spoke to what a goalkeeper faces when numerous bodies inhabit your goalmouth.

“It’s hard when there’s chaos in the box like that. You’re trying to see through people, trying to see where (the ball) is, and you’re talking to your defenders,” Mulder said. “It’s just kind of chaotic.”

Wheaton Academy’s best stretch of attacking play came late in the game, with Sharkey and Ally Witt teaming up nicely up the left side to penetrate deep into Spartans’ territory. Sharkey fired twice on net down the stretch.

“The last five minutes of the game we started to play better, and we had moments in the first half that were good but really only because the wind was at our back,” Marksberry said.

“It wasn’t exactly what we wanted to see from us in response to St. Francis, but we’ve been on top of our games for a number of games in a row. So if you slip a little one time, that happens every now and then.”

Two scoreless overtime periods set up the shootout, where Alexa Sharkey, Lindsey Burke, Thomas, Meghan Grant, and Sydney Sharkey all converted their penalty kicks.

Mulder came out hard and made a sliding stop on the second penalty kick taken by the Spartans.

“I really like p-k’s,” Mulder said. “I get an adrenaline rush. I just try to cover as much ground as I can by coming out as far as I can. I see where the shooter is looking by their body language and just choose a side.”

“Emily does well in shootouts. She’s coming off her line quickly and she got a great jump on it,” said Marksberry, who applauded Thomas and both Sharkey sisters for the day’s work they put in on Thursday.

Wheaton Academy opens regional play at home on Tuesday, against the winner between a pair of Chicago teams in No. 17 Ogden International and No. 16 Noble Charter/Rowe-Clark.

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