Redwings keep ESCC hopes alive vs. Saint Viator

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By Mike Garofola

It was not a good day for Saint Viator on its final regular season match at home.

Benet charged ahead when sophomore Amanda Kaiser fired in a first-half double just before the break, then the visitors added two more after the break to stun the Lions 5-1 in an afternoon match on Monday in Arlington Heights.

The Redwings' faint hopes of at least sharing the ESCC crown with Fenwick rests upon league leader Fenwick stepping on a banana peel against either Marist or Nazareth this week.

"We didn't come to play, and (Benet) did, it was just that simple," said Saint Viator head coach Mike Taylor, who would watch an agonizing 80 minutes of soccer, which saw his club suffer perhaps its worse defeat of the spring.

"This is the game on our schedule that you always look forward to playing, and usually it’s really close and hard fought, but today we were able to finish our chances. For all of the seniors, it feels real good to come away from here with a win," offered Benet senior Brittany Pullen, who pulled her club even at 25 minutes when she converted her spot-kick after a hand ball inside the Lions’ box awarded the visitors a PK.

It was a disastrous afternoon for the Lions, who knew that a victory would place a little bit more pressure on the front-running Friars, while enhancing their own product in advance of the state tournament series, which begins in earnest for Taylor's club next week at the Libertyville regional.

"We had been really playing well, especially in the back after we recently moved one of our best players, Katelyn Hammarlund to sweeper, and installed Victoria Danner back there as well,” Taylor said. “But we just cannot put a healthy first-11 out there for any amount of time, and today we were without Molly (McMahon) in the middle, and we just struggled all over the place for the first time since our new lineup.”

It seemed in the early stages the Lions would just need to withstand some extra pressure from the visitors, who found Madie Burke with long balls over the top along the left side, but it was the home side which manufactured the best chance in the first 10 minutes.

It was Chloe Lutheringshausen the creator and Taylor Skala the shooter that nearly found the back of the net, with Benet keeper Claire Munaretto far off her line in her initial challenge on Lutheringshausen.

This exchange would help the Redwings attack awaken, but at 14 minutes, Skala would venture near the spot to use a deft touch to go past Munaretto just inside the near post.

"We may have had the better of Saint Viator today, but they sure had their chances to score as well, especially in that first half, which would have made things a lot more interesting," offered Benet coach Henry Wind.

The visitors responded just as Wind hoped his club would after the Skala goal, and immediately afterwards Pullen tested Lions keeper Morgan Hess. Team captain Pullen then nearly found Kelly Diedrich with a lovely ball to the back post.

A hand-ball inside the box by one of the Lions' defenders sent Pullen to the spot, where she drew the Redwings level with her spot-kick.

Just after the restart, Skala forced Munaretto into a terrific reaction save when she ran onto a long throw from Erin Renee Murphy. But the combination of the long grass, and little play through the middle, or a lack of possession from both sides would provide little for the faithful to cheer, until the waning moments of the first half.

That's when Kaiser thumped the go-ahead goal into the upper right corner, with Madie Burke providing the helper. Kaiser finished again just seconds before the whistle sounded, with a wonderful touch to finish a throw sent in from Lexie Liber.

"We been having such a difficult time scoring for a long time, because we've been without our top scoring forward, Jamei Borges, and Katie Kaufman has had an ankle injury for awhile,” Wind said. “But today we suddenly were able to finish on the chances we created, and just kind of broke out of our scoring slump.”

Moments into the second half, a well-timed angled run gave Lutheringshausen a chance to cut the Benet lead in half, but a brave challenge off the line by Munaretto forced the sophomore to shoot sooner than she would have liked, and an alert Colleen Lewellyan cleared the rolling ball during her retrieval run.

That would be it for the home side, which would concede two more goals when Rachel Lovely found Borges with a ball over the top. Borges did the rest with a confident zig-zag run into the box to get free and in on Hess, who would have no chance to stop the 4th goal of the match at 46 minutes.

Taylor would bring on Melissa Stawicki for Hess, who deserved a better fate on this day, and did well when tested on two or three occasions, but was unable to save against Meaghan O'Hara, when the sophomore ended the scoring for the day at 68 minutes.

"It was a big let down for all of us when we lost to Fenwick the other day, to just about take us out of the running for a conference title, which is always our No. 1 goal at the start of the season," said Pullen, "so that's why it was so big for us to come out here today beat Saint Viator like we did."

"We got a lot of energy and hard work from (Maria) Schwabe today, and she really helped us keep the pace up when we needed it," commented Wind.

It was the junior who would send in the fateful ball in from the left side which found a hand, setting up the Pullen PK.

"We were very unlucky with that PK, and it probably proved to be the turning point in this match. But the way we played after that also had a lot to do with the final outcome," Taylor said.