Gators fall to Dundee-Crown on late goal

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By Gary Larsen

The game’s final goal was as cruel as Wednesday’s weather, and it ended Crystal Lake South’s season.

With their Class 3A game against Dundee-Crown tied 2-2, the Gators suffered through a diagonal cross on a mission, taken from the right side by the Chargers’ Kyle Hagan with less than two minutes left to play.

Hagan’s serve floated towards a crowd gathered at the far post before falling under the crossbar and landing in the back corner of the net.

Twice in the early going, South senior Charlie Oliver broke behind the Chargers’ back line to reach a through-ball, and was twice turned away by goalkeeper Christian Martinez.

Those two saves were an omen for the night Martinez would have in net. The junior keeper was simply terrific from start to finish, later saving a bending corner kick headed inside the far post and saving a South penalty kick in the second half.

“I thought we managed the game well and did everything we wanted, but you can’t leave that many goals out there,” Crystal Lake South coach Brian Allen said. “We had our chances.

“It’s a game of inches and in the playoffs and in the playoffs a goalkeeper can make or break games. I thought tonight’s game was an example of that. (Martinez) was hot and he shifted momentum several times. If we got one or two of those it might have put them on their heels, but those stops allowed their confidence to grow.”

The regional semifinal at Jacobs in Algonquin was a rematch of the teams’ regular-season, Fox Valley Conference game, which South won 3-2 in overtime.

Wednesday’s game wasn’t exempt from the wicked wind, cold, and rain that swept across postseason soccer in the Chicago area, and the team at Jacobs headed downfield to the south had a stiff gale at its back.

South (13-9) sent a hard-hit shot from distance into Martinez’s chest at 20 minutes off the foot of Sam Murdock, just after the Chargers (9-9-3) sent a good chance just wide. The game’s first goal came when Hagan took a few touches to his right along the top of the Gators’ penalty area, and fired inside the near post at 20 minutes.

The Gators answered with a pair of shots inside the Chargers’ penalty area that were blocked by defenders. At 23 minutes, Hagan stuffed a potentially dangerous shot attempt from 18 yards out taken by South’s Roberto Albuquerque.

Martinez saved a bending corner kick at 30 minutes off the foot of the Gators’ Jack Carlson, and South threatened yet again when Oliver elevated at the far post and just missed getting his head onto a Renato Albuquerque cross from the left side.

The Gators finally tied the game on a play started and finished by Roberto Albuquerque. The senior won a ball in the air near midfield and headed it to the left corner, where Oliver ran it down. Albuquerque got up off the turf and made a run to the 18, where he took Oliver’s return feed and buried it from 16 yards out.

“’Berto did a good job all game of playing that early ball and trying to find our forwards into the seams,” Allen said. “D-C was playing a high line and that gave us a couple of chances early on. And Sam Murdock has kind of been our unsung hero all year long. He’s a sophomore and he went gangbusters tonight. He went hard all over the field and got us that second goal. I thought Roberto and Sam did everything we wanted them to do in the center.”

The senior Albuquerque nearly gave his side the lead at 39 minutes but couldn’t quite get an extended foot onto a serve sent to the far post by freshman brother Renato Albuquerque.

Hagan fired the final shot of the half from close range in the 40th minute but South keeper Steven Follmer made a sliding stop to keep the game knotted at 1-1.

Scoring chances gone astray were plentiful for the Gators through 40 minutes. “Their goalkeeper played well today but we’ve also got to take advantage when those opportunities present themselves,” Allen said. “Credit their keeper but we obviously had an off night.”

South came out hard in the second half and grabbed a 2-1 lead two minutes in, when a Carlson corner kick was cleared to the 18, where Murdock finished from 18 yards out. The lead lasted until the 53rd minute, when the Chargers’ Ozvaldo Ramirez lined up a free kick from 25 yards out on the left side with the wind at his back.

Ramirez sent in a wicked one-hopper that skittered off the wet grass and flew inside the far post to tie the score. Martinez saved an Oliver penalty kick attempt one minute later, leaping to deflect it off the underside of the crossbar and then smothering the ball after it caromed straight down to the ground.

Hagan went wide from close range at 57 minutes and almost got his head on a good chance in close at 69 minutes. Martinez saved Roberto Albuquerque at 75 minutes, before Hagan’s cross floated into net at 78 minutes to effectively give his side the win.

“The momentum shifted after that penalty kick save,” Allen said. “But we still had a couple of chances after that, and then you have to make the saves you need to make. (Follmer) is only a sophomore and he’ll learn from that, but it’s going to sting for a while. And you’ve got to credit D-C for finding a way to hang tough.”

South will bid farewell to seven rostered seniors in Oliver, Brett Wielgos, Alex Alllmandinger, Devon Ross, Roberto Albuquerque, Alex Anderl, and Zane Boettcher.

“It’s a special group. As freshmen they won one game so to come full circle and get 13 wins and getting themselves in position to win the conference, that says a lot,” Allen said.

Albuquerque played club soccer his first three years of high school before joining the Gators for his senior year. “One of his motivations was to come back and play a year with his brother, and I can certainly respect that,” Allen said. “It took him a little while to acclimate playing high school versus club but once he bought into it he gave us a nice, added boost.”

Allmandinger was a team captain who unfortunately wasn’t able to suit up and play for the Gators in his senior season, having suffered a knee injury in the offseason.

“He could have shut it down and just said ‘forget this’,” Allen said. “But he didn’t do that. He was kind of an assistant coach for me and he poured his heart out for the team. And Brett Wielgos has been our backup keeper for two years and I counted on him to push Steve (Follmer) and take on a mentorship role. He gave us his best effort. Sometimes people don’t realize how special it is to have a quality backup keeper like Brett has been for us. He’ll be missed a lot."

Captains Ross and Anderl will also be missed, and Boettcher was the feel-good story of the year at South, having missed all of his junior year due to injury and returning to varsity play mid-way through this season after captaining the program's jayvee team.

"(Boettcher) got promoted to the varsity because of his terrific work rate and attitude," Allen said. "He was probably second only to Charlie in terms of speed and work rate at training and in games.

“Devon was one of our behind-the-scenes leaders this year. Not a flashy player, but very consistent in what he would bring to the table both at training and in games and was a great role model as a captain this year for several of the younger players. From his freshman year to senior year, he probably grew the most as a gawky freshman to a coordinated senior leader who started all 22 games for us as an outside mid.

“Alex Anderl was just a warrior for us this season. All year we preached about being a team that combined players who were warriors with players who are artists and finding combinations of those in each position as being essential.  Alex is our prototype when it comes to future “warriors” and what we will want them to be for us in the future as part of our program.  He was about as dominating a ball-winner as you can find in our area and his value as part of that very inexperienced backline this year was enormous for us.

"The interesting thing to me was how different all of their personalities were. They all showed me the lighter side of training and they showed their spirit in kind of an up-and-down season. Their personalities, and how they coped, kind of helped me cope as well.”

Tri-captain Oliver leaves Allen’s program second all-time in career goals (81) and points (193), and third all-time in assists (31). The Northern Illinois-bound Oliver is a high-level club defender who came within three goals of tying South’s all-time mark for career goals in a four-year varsity career.

“That’s what has made it such an honor for me to coach him for the last four years – he’s willing to do whatever you ask him to do,” Allen said. “If I said ‘go play outside mid’ he’d do it. In back, up top – his versatility is really what separates him from so many other of the best players in the game. He’s got to be up there in the top five players in terms of all the different things that he can do.

“I can’t put into words what I feel about Charlie. Without him the last three years, we’re just an average team. He means the world to me not just as a soccer player but also as a person.”

The Gators’ underclassmen figure to keep a winning tradition alive at South. Juniors Matt Alford, Kai Volkhart, Jack Carlson, CJ Prell, Luis (Smiley) Loera, and Alvaro Morales will be back, along with sophomores Follmer, Murdock, and David Tagatz.

Freshmen Renato Albuquerque, Orlando Tapia, and Charlie Ruff should also play prominent roles next year.

“I think they understand the tradition that Charlie and our other seniors have been a part of building over the past few years,” Allen said. “Hopefully we’ll bring it back to that caliber again next year.”