Blackhawks off to 2-2 start after rolling past Joliet Central

 

 

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By Curt Herron

Four matches obviously doesn't indicate any real trend but it's still a good indicator of what a team might be capable of accomplishing this season.

Thus far, the coaches and players at West Aurora are encouraged by what they've seen through their team's initial four contests, which they've split.

The Blackhawks won their second straight match and improved to 2-2 after rolling to a 9-0 nonconference home victory over Joliet Central on Wednesday.

West scored four goals in the opening half and added three more scores in the first six minutes of the final half to shorten the length of the match.

Coach Laura Wagley's squad only has five seniors and three juniors so younger players are being asked to contribute in significant ways this season.

Of the other 11 players on the team, six are freshmen, giving the Blackhawks a mix of both youth and experience that can have its good and bad points.

But possible concerns about the team's chemistry haven't been an issue and the infusion of new talent has clearly been a major boost for the program.

Perhaps most importantly, it's given the Blackhawks a much more dangerous attack than they had a year ago, when they collected 29 goals in 25 matches.

West was shutout 13 times last season and top scorer Jessica Saffell accounted for all but six of her team's goals, which led to predictable results.

The Blackhawks only scored 15 goals during their last 14 matches and wound up dropping 13 of those contests to finish the year with a 4-19-2 record.

It's been a different story this season, however, as West has scored 13 goals in its last three matches, though nine came against a brand new program.

After seeing a l-0 halftime lead slip away in a 3-2 loss to Plainfield South in their home opener, the Blackhawks picked up a 2-0 home win over Morris.

The team's back-to-back shutouts over Morris and Joliet Central are noteworthy since that total already equals West's shutouts for all of last season.

Wagley hopes to learn more about her squad when it meets a pair of talented teams in Plainfield North on Saturday and Naperville Central next Tuesday.

But for the time being, the Blackhawks hope to build on what they've seen thus far in their efforts to significantly improve on last season's showing.

"The youger kids have been holding their own," Wagley said. "They know the game very well and our older girls trust them. What I like is that we can put anyone out on the field and the players adapt.

"I took the touch program my college and every day before we start practice, the girls get about 1000 touches and you can tell that it's helping them out a lot and all of the girls get along very well.

"We found out a lot about ourselves playing against Plainfield South and we'll know more after playing Plainfield North and Naperville Central. The more we see good teams like that, the better we'll get."

 

In a sign of how things have changed, Saffell hadn't scored a goal yet in West's first three matches before having a successful day on Wednesday.

The junior collected a hat trick against the Steelmen, capping things off by registering her final goal just 12 seconds into the second half.

She also scored in the second minute following an assist from Sammie O'Brien and added a goal in the 13th minute off a pass from Alicia Rotolo.

No longer asked to do it all at a forward spot as she did a year ago, Saffell now should benefit her team even more playing out of the midfield.

"With our incoming freshmen, we're a lot better off than we've been during the past couple of years," Saffell said. "We're just looking to keep improving and we've done that in our last two games.

"We're good on defense since we had pretty much everyone returning from last year. But we've had a lot of incoming players that play on offense and that's really helped us get more shots.

"I like how we all get along really well and we do a lot of bonding and that really helps. We've made a lot of progress considering we had a lot of new people. Now we all know how everyone plays."

Freshman O'Brien scored two goals and had an assist. The first came in the fourth minute and the other in the 43rd minute with Rotolo getting both assists.

O'Brien is one of four Blackhawks who has scored three goals this season. Freshmen Riley Kulakowski and O'Brien and junior Saffell are the others.

"We had a rough start against Naperville North and we were kind of disappointed after we lost our first home game," O'Brien said. "But we've focused more in practice and we're starting to do better.

"We're getting along really well and learning about how we can play together. As a freshman, you kind of feel like you have weight on your shoulders if you don't get the job done but it's not like that.

"I like how much the seniors and juniors have talked to the incoming people. They helped us out a lot at the beginning of the year. Even though they yelled at us some, it was for our own good."

Rotolo also had a productive day for the Blackhawks on Wednesday, collecting a goal in the 28th minute while adding assists on three other scores.

West also got goals from sophomore Damaris Rocha in the 46th minute, Kulakowski in the 66th minute and senior Rachel Simpson in the final minute of play.

The Blackhawk defense made the afternoon a frustrating for the Steelmen, who have few experienced players after the split of the combined Joliet program.

"Having so many new people on the team has helped the older players to play differently," Rotolo said. "We started off a bit rocky but once we've been playing together, we've started to get better.

"The juniors and seniors help out the freshmen but we can also help them out with new stuff, too. I like that we can teach each other new things and that we work together well and have a family bond.

"Our progress has been really good and practices have helped a lot. You can see that we're getting better on our first touches and then our passing got better and also our through balls."