Pascente shines and Graefen finishes to knock off Oswego East

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By Bill Scheibe

As Plainfield Central’s Kelsey Graefen walked up to a soccer ball sitting on the penalty-kick stripe, Oswego East freshman goalkeeper Hannah Gargrave headed toward her spot between the goal posts.

For the fifth round of the shootout, on a cold and muddy Thursday night, the rain-turned-drizzle had slowed to a trickle. And Graefen, a senior midfielder/forward, realized the enormity of the situation.

 “I had to score,” Graefen said, “to win.”

One shot. One goal.

Just like a thousand times in practice, Graefen put one and one together for a winning combination. She converted a low spinner into the right corner to snap a 3-3 deadlock in the penalty- kick shootout finale, lifting the host Wildcats to an exhausting 3-2 Southwest Prairie Conference victory over Oswego East.

During regulation, junior midfielder Lauren Kulaga headed home a corner kick by Graefen with 2:07 remaining in the first half for Plainfield Central (7-6-1, 3-2). Then, with only 12:05 left in the second half, sophomore forward Sami Jensen scored the equalizer off another sparkplug corner kick by Graefen.

For Oswego East (9-5-1, 3-2), which again deserved a better fate, junior midfielder Carli Schlaker and sophomore forward Brittany Brewer scored goals in an eight-minute stretch of the first half for a 2-0 advantage. Brewer and sophomore sweeper Anida Phetchanpheng contributed through-ball assists.

But from there, as the Wolves saw shots by Schlaker, Brewer and sophomore midfielder Sam Lee land either off the post or crossbar, senior goalkeeper Janna Pascente channeled the Blackhawks’ Corey Crawford. She finished with 18 saves, including 7 in the pair of overtimes that set up the PK stage.

One word: amazing.

“Yep, yep, that’s for sure,” said Plainfield Central coach Ken Schoen, who was impressed by Pascente’s clean stop of a Brewer one-timer with 3:55 left in the second OT. “I told Janna before the PKs started, ‘There’s no pressure on you. We wouldn’t be here without you.’ She made a lot of great saves.”

“Absolutely,” Oswego East coach Lauren Anderson said. “Their goalkeeper did a fabulous job for them. We were knocking on the door, but we just couldn’t kick it in, and their goalie did a fantastic job.”

The job for both teams went past 80 minutes, with Oswego East shooting first in the PKs. Lee scored into the left corner and junior midfielder Britney Lenza nailed the upper-right corner for a 1-1 tie. In the second round, sophomore defender Lisa Schroeder drilled a shot off the right post and in for a 2-1 lead.

After a second straight miss for the Wolves, sophomore defender Melissa Del Sarto scored into the lower-left corner for a 3-1 Plainfield Central edge. Sophomore midfielder Megan Moran then tallied into the upper-left corner off the tips of Pascente’s gloves, cutting the deficit down to a manageable 3-2.

“Crazy,” Kulaga said of the shootout. “It’s so nerve-racking, but we practice them every day. We know how to finish because we work on them and we have them down. I’m glad we finished them like that.”

A fantastic finish materialized when Kulaga’s potential PK winner in the fourth round deflected off the gloves of Gargrave (5 saves), off the crossbar and out of danger. Phetchanpheng started the fifth round by powering a low shot into the right corner, establishing a 3-3 tie for an admittedly frayed Graefen.

“I was a little nervous because I saw how fast the goalkeeper came out against Lauren’s attempt,” Graefen said. “I knew that I had to pick it up, and I place it to the same spot every time. I have sort of have a routine – kind of like a basketball free-throw thing. I have the same routine every time, too.”

“Obviously, there’s no one I trust going in that fifth spot than her,” Schoen said of Graefen. “That’s why we had her there in that fifth spot, just in case we needed her to score, and it worked out pretty well.”

Still, the biggest example of a workout belonged to Pascente. She was the salt to Oswego East’s pepper, stopping a Brewer breakaway in the first half before Schlaker smacked a Brewer cross off the short-side left post into Pascente’s hands. In the second half, Brewer punched another break off the far-left post.

And that, seemingly, was just the beginning for the Wolves’ onslaught. Lee buried a shot that skidded off the top of the crossbar with 4:01 left in the second half. Pascente stopped sophomore midfielder Megan Ross on a break with 14 seconds left. And in the second OT, Schlaker and Brewer went back-to-back.

Gee whiz.

“You know what, it shouldn’t have come down to this,” Anderson nodded. “We had plenty of opportunities throughout the game and we just couldn’t finish them. We just couldn’t connect.”

However, in the first half, Oswego East executed a better connection than the Internet. Schlaker started the scoring with 19:55 left, faking inside and tapping the ball outside to create a space before firing a shot into the far-right corner. Brewer blasted in a breakaway from Phetchanpheng at 11:59 to go.

“It was a good shot and I’m really happy I made it,” Schlaker said. “We’re always good at connecting our passes and moving toward the goal, and we’re usually good at finishing our crosses. But I think what happened is our heads went down when they caught up to us and made it into a really close game.”

“I got a good ball from Anida in the back,” Brewer said. “It led me through, I had a great follow through and I’m glad I got the goal in. I just wish I had scored more. I had way too many shots, way too many chances to score. On penalty kicks, they are a 50-50 chance, and we were unlucky to come up short.”

Nothing short of beautiful was Kulaga’s header off Graefen’s corner, slicing the halftime deficit to 2-1. Jensen provided the knot after Graefen’s corner was whacked at by sophomore defender Jessica Munkvold on the right post. The ball ended up on the left post, with Jensen scoring into an empty net.

“I was so thrilled that we got that,” Kulaga said. “We needed that to step up our confidence, to get our confidence back up. We were all in there trying so hard, trying to get a head on it, and the timing was perfect. I was trying so hard to be there, moving myself in front of the ball. It worked out great for us.”

Similarly, after PKs by Lenza, Schroeder and Del Sarto boosted the Wildcats to a 3-1 lead and Moran and Phetchanpheng created the 3-3 deadlock, Graefen’s shootout strike brought the celebration to midfield.

One shot. One goal. One sentiment.

“Awesome,” Graefen said, smiling about her reaction. “It’s the same way that they won last year against us, on penalty kicks, so that makes it a sweet victory. The goalie came running out, so I was like, ‘OK, I have to go fast.’ And when I scored, I was so relieved it was over with and I got to do it for my team.”