Grens fight the good fight in loss to Barrington

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By Gary Larsen

Elk Grove’s Trevor Cwiok is enduring the pain while Barrington’s Bryan Adams has worked through the pain of endurance.

After Barrington’s 3-1 win over visiting Elk Grove on Friday, coaches for both players voiced appreciation for the pair of seniors – Cwiok for playing through pain and Adams for his relentless presence as an outside mid.

Like all outside mids, one of Adams’ primary responsibilities is to run all day.

“Bryan plays really hard,” Barrington coach Scott Steib said. “He’s really been doing a nice job at left mid. He’s more of an outside back but he plays hard. You can talk to him about how it’s more of an offensive role than he’s used to.”

“Since I was eight years old I played left defense my entire life,” Adams said. “My sophomore year our jayvee coach put me at outside mid and I had like six assists, and I kept getting assists last year. I’m more confident at left defender but I enjoy playing outside mid, where maybe I can even score a goal.”
 
Cwiok, meanwhile, spent Friday night filling in at center mid for the Grens, a brace supporting his still-healing right knee.

With a soccer ball-sized bag of ice on his knee after the game, Cwiok limped over to be interviewed, shrugged off his bum knee and grinned. “I know,” he said. “I’m a mess.”

Then he talked about his Grenadiers and gave props to one of his teammates in the process.

“I think the guys are starting to realize the physical presence that’s needed. Gio (Garcia) has really stepped up,” Cwiok said. “He’s playing one-, two-touch, he’s turning, he’s using his body a lot better. As his teammate, I feel much more confident when he has the ball.”

Bush was also pleased with Garcia’s play, and tipped his hat to Cwiok as the senior fights his way towards recovery.

“The more he plays the more comfortable he’s getting. When we moved him to the middle tonight, that’s when we had some good luck,” Bush said.

Elk Grove (2-6-2, 1-4-1 in MSL play) fought to work the ball through the midfield early in Friday’s contest, and Garcia put a shot just over the crossbar from distance four minutes in. The Grens had a corner kick at 19 minutes served to the near post, where Broncos’ keeper Max Redpath smothered it.

Barrington’s Reid Strain served a ball to the post that Adams fired high on at 11 minutes, and Strain hit a free kick at 17 minutes from 35 yards out that got deflected towards the post, where Grens keeper Mike Ragano dove to make the stop.

Barrington (3-5-2, 1-1-1) struck pay dirt when Strain was tripped in the box and converted the penalty kick at 23 minutes. At times, the big Barrington forward seemed like a one-man gang to the Grens’ back line.

“He was a horse, running at us, and when your defense is running towards your own goal you’re not going to be too successful,” Bush said. “He did that to us and they earned that PK because they were working hard.”

Strain struck again at 28 minutes when he located a ball in a crowd and chipped Ragano to give Barrington a 2-0 lead. Craig Zahour was credited with an assist on the play.

Redpath left his line two minutes into the second half to punch out a Grens corner kick serve, and Ragano made a diving stop of a Strain rip from distance a minute later. Barrington’s Danny Jaderholm hit the crossbar on a Zahour feed at 46 minutes, as the Broncos began to apply a more suffocating level of pressure.

“We’ve been struggling to connect passes but I thought we moved the ball around tonight,” Steib said. “We just need to score more goals in the run of play. We had chances (in the second half) and I’d just like to see us finish a few more of those.”

Adams similarly likes the trend he’s seeing with his side. “Our defense is definitely letting in less goals and we’re starting to connect passes a lot stronger,” Adams said. “We’re also taking more shots, which we weren’t doing before.

The Broncos’ Ethan Claes sent a shot wide on a Grant McAndrews feed at 54 minutes, and it was Claes who played a ball to teammate Tyler Deacon at 63 minutes that gave Barrington a 3-0 lead.

Deacon streaked onto the pass with space in front of him on the right side and deposited a beauty of a strike to the back netting from 14 yards out.

“That’s what you do – put it on frame where (the keeper’s) not. You’ve got to have some composure and confidence in that situation,” Steib said.

With Barrington pressuring in the second half, the Grens fell into a bad habit of sending long balls that were headed right back into their defensive third.

“No matter where anyone is, we’ve still got to move the ball around,” Cwiok said. “We just need to be more patient. We get too hyped and think we have to play the ball forward, when sometimes we can play it back and keep the other team thinking. If we play long ball after long ball, they know it’s coming.”

Bush liked what his boys showed him from that point forward, as a young Grens team continued to fight despite their three-goal deficit.

“After that we played well,” he said. “We had a few opportunities on corners, Conor (Murphy) hit the post – and if that went in it would have been a 3-2 game. But it’s a good result for us. We’ve been growing, we’ve brought up some younger guys to put some heat on the older guys, and it’s been fun. We’re young and we’re growing.”

The Grens played without starting central midfielder Justin Gavros on Friday, and the junior midfielder will return to the fold on Monday.

“We brought (sophomore) Sergio Acquire up from jayvee two days ago and he was playing against (Strain). I thought he did all right, for a 15-year-old playing against an 18-year-old,” Bush said.

A Garcia corner kick at 68 minutes started the play that broke the Grens’ scoring drought. The Grens’ score was announced as an own-goal over the PA system, probably due to the crowd at the goalmouth that occluded the finish.

“I went up for a header, there was kind of a scrum, and then Zach (Solorio) put it in,” Cwiok said.

Steib liked what he got from his guys around the park on Friday.

“Ethan (Claes) is doing well. Him and Colter (Williams) have been solid for us all year and John Gallagher has played well. And Craig (Zahour) is Craig,” Steib said of his all-purpose senior. “Brian Sheets played well tonight, he plays hard, and Brett Qualiardi has logged a lot of minutes in back.

“If we get Dylan Nelson back I might start playing Reid and Craig up front. We pushed Grant (McAndrew) out wide today and I think he was a little better out here because he’s pretty crafty. But we’re still trying to find ourselves. We’re eleven games into the season. We’ll usually tinker for four or six games, but there’s still time.”

The Broncos annually play a rock-solid schedule that belies their record.

“Right now our record isn’t what we’d like it to be but that can be an advantage for us, if anyone looks at 3-5-2 and thinks we’re a bad team, because we’ll just destroy them,” Adams said.

“This was definitely very positive, compared to what we’ve been doing. Even the goal that was scored on us could have been prevented, and we had a lot of chances today.”