Fire U-17/18 clinches playoff berth with victory over Internationals

By Curt Herron

The Fire Academy's U-17/18 team went into the weekends matches in Ohio knowing that they needed to at least claim one win to reach the postseason.

With Sunday opponent Columbus also vying for a wildcard spot in the US Soccer Development Academy playoffs, Saturday's match with the Internationals was key.

Leaving nothing to chance for Sunday, the Fire went out and took care of business against the Internationals, capturing a 2-1 victory in Medina, Ohio.

In a scenario that was nearly duplicated a while later by the U-15/16 Fire, Chicago scored a goal in the tenth minute before going up 2-0 in the second half.

And in another strange twist of fate, both Fire squads gave up goals to the Internationals during the final minute of play to miss out on shutouts.

Following Saturday's win, the Fire (7-4-4, 22 points) was already assured of one of 12 wildcard spots due to their overall average points per match.

As it turned out, it was a good thing that the Fire got a win on Saturday since they suffered a 2-1 defeat to the playoff-bound Crew the next day.

Jacob Brindle connected on a short attempt following a steal and pass from Manny Guzman during the tenth minute to put the Fire on top for good.

Then in the 67th minute, Luis Medina directed a pass toward Felipe Cortez, who connected from close range to give the visitors a 2-0 advantage.

Keeper Zak Allen faced few threats, thanks to the efforts of defenders Peter Beasley, David Caban, Lalo Cuautle and Anthony Torres.

The Internationals found the net in the 90th minute when Vlad Lekarev connected on a long shot shortly before the final whistle blew.

After getting off to a 1-3-2 start in Great Lakes play, the Fire improved to 6-1-2 in the division prior to Sunday's match with the Crew.

"We knew that if we won today that we'd go to the playoffs, and that's what we really wanted, " Guzman said. "We wanted to reach the playoffs and go on from there.

"We started off pretty slow at the beginning of the season but after a few games and practices we started to get better as a team. We want to keep moving forward."

The Fire had other good chances to add to their early advantage during the first half but were thwarted by keeper Toby Frohlich.

On one sequence, Brindle had a liner topped over the net, Cuautle's corner was punched away and Guzman's rebound was denied.

During the final 10 minutes, Victor Pineda later had a shot halted and Cuautle saw another corner kick punched away by the keeper.

Following the break, Guzman lined a pair of corner kicks to Frohlich before Allen shut down a potential threat from Matt Foldesy.

A short time later, Cortez had a try hauled in before Frohlich broke up a threat before Luis Medina could get off a shot.

Cortez had another shot tipped away a short while before connecting off of an assist from Medina midway through the final half.

Following the second goal, Cortez and Medina were each denied on attempts while Joey Calistri was stopped on a pair of efforts.

It looked like the Fire would emerge with their sixth shutout of division play but the hosts scored with about 10 seconds left.

"It means a lot to clinch a playoff berth today," Brady Wahl said. "Our first mission was to make it into the playoffs and hopefully now we can make a run there.

"With the way we started out, we kind of put ourselves behind the eight ball. We knew that we were going to have to do a lot of work to get back into contention.

"When you see team improve completely on their start, team chemistry is definitely a big part of it. We work for each other and that's why we're in the playoffs.

"We've kept the intensity up in training and I think that's transferred over to our matches. The adversity we've come through has made us ready for the playoffs."