Spartans and Pretzels tie 1-1
Poulos-to-Pena combo earns the draw in Wheaton

 

By Chris Walker

You really couldn't blame St. Francis if it wasn't feeling it.

The Spartans were recovering from a busy and draining Homecoming weekend, lost 3-2 to Elgin on Saturday, didn't expect to be playing in 85-degree weather in October and their body clocks weren't accustomed to a 1 p.m. match on a Monday.

Heck, even St. Francis coach Kristin Keigley wasn't her normal self. Keigley spent most of the match sitting on the Spartans' bench, massaging one of her sore ankles. Keigley ran the Chicago Marathon on Sunday. And yes, she did finish (5:11.08).

The Spartans also finished strong, pleasing Keigley by showing a lot of energy late in the second half and carrying it over for the final 40 minutes in securing a 1-1 draw with visiting Freeport.

"It was hot out and homecoming weekend but I thought a lot of them played pretty solid at times today," Keigley said. "It still wasn't our best. I thought we've played much better in the past few weeks."

Goalkeeper Ryan Suerte, as well as Kyle Bhatia, David Kaminky, Drew Mascari, Michael Vale, Wes Dorman, T.J. Kliebhan, Nick Konchel, Matt Bonner, Andy Wood, Perry Poulos and Andres Pena all saw plenty of minutes on Monday.

Freeport (8-6-4) isn't the same team that finished fourth in the state in Class 2A last fall. The Pretzels beat the Spartans 3-1 last year too. Freeport only returned three players from last year's team and is young with only three seniors on their roster.

"At times we can play quality soccer, but we're inconsistent, and our soccer I.Q., when tired, goes way down," Freeport coach Nick Namio said. "We played good today for the first 10 minutes and then maybe the last 15 minutes, and struggled in between that."

The Pretzels did their only offensive damage in those opening minutes when Mike Gordon simply outran everybody and finished. Unfortunately for Gordon and the Pretzels, he would only play about 10 minutes in the contest due to an injury.

"He's kind of our goal-scoring weapon," Namio said. "So it was unfortunate that he got hurt."

St. Francis (7-12-0) made it 1-all in the 36th minute thanks to patient execution by Poulos. The junior's corner kick ended up caroming back to him. He gathered it in, waited to see how some of the Pretzels players would react and strategized his options. Then, he sent it toward the penalty area where Pena headed it past Freeport goalkeeper Justin Holden.

"Perry stayed calm and saw that I was open," Pena said. "It was basically a good read by Perry."

Patience is something Keigley is stressing to her players so she was pleased to see it pay off.

"We've been working on it," she said. "And ever since we've moved Anders to the outside mid he's really done some good things for us."

The Spartans appeared to come to life after Pena's equalizer, controlling the tempo of the game the rest of the way and winning more than their share of 50/50 balls. They also had more scoring opportunities than the Pretzels but just couldn't find the back of the net for the game-winner.

"The center of the field has definitely been a strength for us at times this season so it was good to see us winning those 50/50s," Keigley said. "But the offense still is a problem and we're hoping we come through on some of these scoring chances soon."

A win would've given the Spartans their third win in their past four matches, but they'll settle for the draw.

"A tie is a tie," Pena said. "You're disappointed that you could've won but then you're kind of happy that you didn't lose. I guess we played a lot better than they did in the second half, but what are you going to do?"