Huskies stay unbeaten in 3-0 win over Rams
By Chris Walker

There’s no denying that soccer is a physically demanding game. The clock only stops for injuries or if someone scores, so athletes are tested for 40 minutes in each half, doing a lot of sprinting and jogging and often for great lengths.

Recovery after a game is important. It allows a player to recuperate from all the stopping and going, turning and cutting, as well as contact with other players.

But sometimes recovery is cut short. Sometimes it’s nothing more than a decent night of sleep, a couple ibuprofens and a day spent in the classroom.

Such will be the case for Naperville North (4-0-1, 3-0 in DVC play), which on Wednesday night began what will certainly be looked back on as one of the biggest tests and stretches of the Class 3A defending state champions’ 2013 season.

The Huskies received a pair of goals from Abbie Boswell and shutout visiting Glenbard East, 3-0, in a DuPage Valley Conference match.

Next up for the Huskies is another DVC match, tonight at West Chicago. They’ll head to Waubonsie Valley to face the Warriors on Friday night before returning home on Saturday to host West Aurora in a matinee. They’ll play four games in as many days.

While it’s always nice set the tone in a match by scoring early, it played an even bigger role on Wednesday night for Naperville North coach Steve Goletz. Knowing his girls would be on the field for better than five hours of action the next few days, getting a score from Boswell just minutes in proved huge.

“Anytime you can get an early goal is a good thing, but especially tonight with the schedule we have and the spring being like it’s been weather-wise,” he said. “It’s unrealistic to think I can play 11 girls for 80 minutes so tonight it was great for Abbie to score an opportunistic goal early and then to have a great collective effort like we did.”

While Naperville North’s leaders, including last year’s DVC all-conference selections, Boswell, Christa Szalach and Cora Climo make a lot of headlines, there were many other Huskies who pitched in significant minutes to keep the Rams off the scoreboard and cruise to victory.

“Alli Svoboda was very good in the middle, Caroline Rico did some nice things,” Goletz said. “Jen Fortman played great in the back, Lily Butler and Sarah Feder and Claire Hilburger continue to step up and give a lot. I think the most important thing is that the contribution level didn’t drop and that’s big to keep a team off the board.”

Boswell increased Naperville North’s lead to 2-0 with 7:47 remaining before halftime as she connected with a Jillian Van Kampen corner kick.

“Before the game we had talked about scoring early and allowing us to relax a bit,” Van Kampen said. “Abbie helped us do that right away but it took a while to get that second one. Then they had to chase us the rest of the game, which is what we wanted to make them do.”

Bowell has now scored two goals in each of her past three games.

“We knew with Zoe (Swift) out that we had to focus on stopping Boswell and we didn’t,” Glenbard East coach Kent Overbey said. “We came out flat and then Boswell puts them on the board right away.”

Glenbard East (5-3-2, 0-2-1) didn’t pose much of an offensive threat to the Huskies and Overbey agreed that falling behind quickly didn’t help, nor did sub-40 degree weather and the fact that the Rams might’ve been a bit intimidated.

“We didn’t have a good effort coming out and you can’t make mistakes or not be ready to play against them,” he said. “We’ve been efficient in the final third this season but we didn’t get many chances. The girls were too jumpy in front and rushed and that didn’t help us.”

One positive was goalkeeper Veronica Fairbairn who made her fair share of saves to keep the Rams in the game.

“Without her big saves back there it could’ve been a 5-0 or 6-0 game,” Overbey said. “So that’s a bright spot but a loss is a loss.”

Another good sign was that the Rams showed more effort in the second half.

“I thought our effort was a lot better and we talked to them about that and they felt they didn’t have their best effort overall,” Overbey said. “But you’ve got to have the effort all night.”

Rainy, wet, windy and cold are four words that do a darn good job of describing this spring and all were on-hand on Wednesday. While the conditions continue to play a factor, they apparently aren’t slowing the Huskies.

“I think as coaches we have it worse standing here,” Goletz said. “We have such a great group of seniors that have been through so many things that nothing affects them. Of course, they’re waiting for warmer weather too and it’ll come. They’re just doing a great job of grinding things out even when things haven’t been super smooth.”

Climo said an extra effort to loosen up before the game proves key in such poor conditions.

“I just try to warm up a lot and make an extra effort to get loose,” she said. “It’s been a crazy weather season and you just try to get as used to it as much as possible.”

While some players might adjust their game due to the poor weather conditions, Boswell only knows one way to play – 100 percent – or as she likes to say, “150 percent.”

“We’ve got great trainers and a great field so we’ve got nothing to worry about than to give it our all,” she said. “We just try to give 150 percent all the time.”

So it’s now one down, three to go for the Huskies during their four-game, four-day stretch.

So far, so good.

“Every game is different and sometimes you’ll play your best and sometimes you won’t,” Climo said. “I was very happy with our team and hopefully we can continue to do well tomorrow.”