Burikas' heroics cap comeback win for Knights

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By Gary Larsen

It’s a thankless job to be an outside midfielder, but Prospect’s outside mids were given their due after the Knights’ 2-1 overtime win against host Palatine on Tuesday.

With his side down 1-0 in the Mid-Suburban League contest, Prospect (9-0-2, 4-0-1) coach Kurt Trenkle called upon his boys on the outside to be difference-makers.

“Even though we were listless I thought we were playing quality soccer. We were controlling the middle third but we couldn’t enter with any kind of numbers,” Trenkle said. “We weren’t getting forward with speed. I gave our outside mids that task. They had to be the ones to lead the charge so we could get numbers in their final third.”

So Alex Schnepf, Matt Wruskyj, Kevin Nunez, and Kennedy McNamara went to work.

“Their outside mids changed the game,” Palatine (8-4, 3-4-0) coach Willie Filian said.

Not only did Prospect’s outside mids change momentum and give speedy forwards Bill Cooney and Richard Lenke better chances to penetrate in the final third, Wruskyj netted a game-tying goal and Schnepf had the assist on defender Matthew Burikas’ game-winner, with 33 seconds left in a second and final overtime period.

And when a defender scores a game-winning goal in overtime -- against a conference rival, no less – you can count on his teammates congratulating him to within an inch of life. Burikas survived a swarm of teammates that converged on him after he stepped onto Schnepf’s serve and headed it home.

“Alex had a great cross to me in our last game, too. I knew I had to time it perfectly and right when he hit it, I went in,” Burikas said. “Then I just had to get my head onto it.

“The goal Palatine scored really changed the game. We knew what we had to do. And then Matt Wruskyj just pulled one out. He pulled one out of nowhere and just put it upper ninety. Then I knew we had a chance to at least get it to overtime. It gave our team a chance.”

Through 40 minutes, quality play on the field resulted in only a few dangerous scoring chances for either side. Neither Prospect keeper Brad Reibel nor Palatine keeper Evan Held were tested through 15 minutes.

At 16 minutes, Lenke deked a defender and took a ball up the endline on the left side but his centering pass was cleared out, and one minute later Cooney streaked into the box and went around a charging Held, then chased the ball down at the endline and served to Lenke, whose head shot went wide.

Palatine’s Cesar Valdez fired from 25 yards out right into Reibel’s hands, Prospect’s Stefano Dolomas worked a give-and-go up the right side with Cooney at 22 minutes, but Dolomas headed Cooney’s return serve towards the goalmouth just wide.

Palatine’s Kyle Clancy tackled Lenke 18 yards out at 24 minutes to break up potential danger, and Prospect’s Avi Chitman fired at the near post at 32 minutes with Held there to save it. Palatine’s Jack Reynolds fired high from distance a minute later.

Palatine was a different animal to start the second half, keeping more of the ball and applying pressure to a Prospect backline that went into Tuesday’s game having only given up 3 goals in 10 games.

Reibel saved Palatine’s Saul Gutierrez from 16 yards out at 49 minutes, and the Pirates’ Jon Clark forced Reibel to make a diving save at the post soon thereafter.

The game stayed scoreless until the 61st minute, when Palatine’s Johnny Enriquez fired from 18 yards out and teammate Josh Lee’s head shot redirected it to the back netting.

“The work rate and organization were there,” Filian said of his side’s second-half surge. “That’s the only way to pressure. When we’re organized and the pressure was good, we held the ball well and when we got it back we didn’t give it away right away.”

Clark agreed.

“Leading up to our goal, that’s when we were clicking and that’s what we need to be doing, eighty minutes a game. We were looking for people off the ball, people were running off the ball, and we had a lot of control in the middle,” Clark said. “We just need to commit to a hundred percent work rate, all the time. That’s when we were playing our best today. “

Chasing a 1-0 deficit, Prospect kept grinding it out until Wruskyj rode up on his white horse and tied the game at 72 minutes.

“We were very listless for the first 60 minutes of that game, until Wruskyj took it upon himself to make that play,” Trenkle said. “That was stunning. He put it across the mouth of the goal and hit the upper ninety. It woke us up. We were not playing with the intensity we needed to play with before that.”

Prospect’s outside mids keyed much of the rest of the contest, leading to Burikas’ game-winner. The unbeaten Knights have now outscored their opponents 28-4 this season.

“We knew we had to make it up today because we can’t let goals like that go in. We’ve got a great defense and all the midfielders are working hard on the defensive end, too,” Burikas said. “And then we’ve got Reibel in net.”

Trenkle applauded another steady day’s work put in by Ihor Lehkiv and tipped his hat to the job his guys in back have done this season.

“Brad has already set our program’s shutout record but he will always tell you that it’s the unit in front of him,” Trenkle said. “They hold their shape so well and he knows where the shots are coming from.

“Ethan (Graven) is just a shut-down defender on the outside. He’s been locking down everyone he’s been faced with. And then (Conor) O’Leary and Johnny (Fredericks) have been interchangeable on the outside. Their energy is good, and everyone can control the ball and start the offense.”

Despite the loss, Palatine got solid contributions from their players up the heart of the field.

“Jon Clark is playing hurt but he was dangerous when he got the ball, and Jack (Reynolds) covered a lot of ground for us,” Filian said. “He’s always around the ball. Centrally, I thought Jason Palmas and Tim Murphy did a nice job bottling up, and Kyle Clancy did a nice job.

The Pirates have only given up 15 goals in 12 games this year, but the final one scored on Tuesday night was hard to take.

“We just talked about how the play inside our box needs to get better,” Filian said. “It wasn’t just that last ball. We’ve got a couple kids out that usually win balls in there but again, our play inside of our box has to be better. That’s where the game is won and lost.”

“We haven’t clicked as a team mentally yet,” Clark said. “We’re doing the work and getting our work rate up, but we all just need to commit to a hundred percent work rate, all the time.”