Naperville C. stuns W. Aurora
Redhawks' Hillman notches game-winner with 2:34 remaining
By Chris Walker
AURORA – Sophie Epelbaum had barely settled in as goalkeeper to begin the second half of Monday’s season opener for Naperville Central before she was seriously tested.
The junior didn’t realize it at the time but her save not even four minutes after the start of the second half kept the Redhawks in the game. Later they rallied to not just tie to game, but earn the game-winner on the road. Abbey Hillman's tally in the final minutes led Naperville Central to a dramatic 2-1 win.
“I’m very pleased that we found two, because we didn’t have many games last year that we had more than one goal. So that’s a good sign,” Redhawks coach Ed Watson said. “A couple of seniors found the back of the net, which is good. And it could’ve been 2-0 if it wasn’t for Sophie (Epelbaum) making that big save. If (West Aurora) goes up 2-0 five minutes into the second half, we’re in a lot of trouble. So she made that big save and then we went with the adjustments we had just talked about at halftime.”
Senior Maddie Mills scored from Hillman with 10:31 left to play to break the shutout and knot the score at 1-1.
It remained that way until a West Aurora defender was unable to clear the ball and Hillman pounced on the opportunity lofting a shot that West Aurora sophomore goalkeeper Brisa Solias was unable to come up with with 2:34 left to play.
“It just kind of bounced out of the box after it came off a defender,” Hillman said. “I feel like you should get the ball back in there when that happens and just do the best you can to get the goal because you never know what’s going to happen.”
And just like that, Naperville Central, a program which has struggled in putting the ball in the back of the net in recent seasons, is on pace to score 42 goals this year.
“That would shatter what we’ve done the last few years,” Watson said. “We’ll take it.”
The Redhawks (1-0-0) have scored 31 goals each of the past two seasons, but that number includes big offensive games against one team. If you remove those blowout games, they have scored just 47 goals in 45 games over the past two seasons. They scored 47 in 2016 alone.
“We made some adjustments at halftime, and I thought the girls, as the game wore on, started to recognize that there was some advantage in the adjustments we made,” Watson said. “Credit to them to realize that if certain things aren’t working, we’ve got to make some changes. I think we had better opportunities in the second half. We probably possessed the ball better in the first half, but we had better opportunities in the second half.”
They created 18 shots overall so they were certainly busy creating chances. It just took longer than Watson had hoped for them to finally finish.
“I’m very happy to be walking out of here with a win,” he said. “That’s for sure.”
Naperville Central, ranked no. 33 in Chicagoland Soccer’s First 50 poll, returned 17 players so expectations are high, especially since they had a nice postseason run last spring.
“We maximized our time outside in the cold (in preseason practice), so we were really excited for this game today,” Hillman said. “I think we did a good job of ball movement as a team, especially for the first game. We need to work on communication between the backline and the forwards with moving and stuff, but I think this was a good team effort, but we will have to work on continuing to get better.”
Epelbaum, who played the second half after senior Amber Hunter worked the first, liked how her team didn’t freak out when it went down 1-0 early, and that they kept fighting to score the game-winner rather than simply being satisfied with the late goal to tie the game.
For her big save early in the second half and her strong play throughout the remainder of said half, Epelbaum earned the Chicagoland Soccer MVP of the Match honor.
“I was really glad that we were able to keep our spirit up and really work for the win in the end,” she said. “I was really impressed with our technical stuff. A lot of the girls were good at their feet, making good touches. And we made a lot of smart decisions. I think our transitions were a little too slow getting back to defense and communicating between offense and defense, but overall I was really impressed with us.”
West Aurora’s inability to hold onto a lead and then surrender the go-ahead goal when the game appeared destined to end in a draw certainly put a damper on the opener for the Blackhawks.
What it didn’t do was make coach Laura Wagley forget about what she witnessed in the first half, because it was something she hadn’t seen before. Sure, she’d seen her team lead at the half plenty of times before, but this was something more.
“At halftime I told them that in my 10 years that was the best first half I’ve seen out of any team that I’ve had,” she said. “We came out strong. We played aggressive. We were confident, and we were ready to go, and I think Naperville Central is a great team.”
While the loss will sting, albeit briefly, Wagley thinks that so much that transpired throughout the afternoon will have a positive impact, especially on the girls playing unfamiliar roles and those who are new, including on the backline and goal line, which are truly inexperienced.
“We knew going in that our offense would be really good but our defense is so young back there with a brand new sweeper (freshman Krystal Diaz) and a new goalie (Solis). So we know if we get the ball on offense we’ll be just fine, but our defense might take some time.”
With more experience, the Redhawks had the advantage of depth in this one.
“They can sub all day, and I cannot do that,” Wagley said. “And having Kiara (McPherson) out really hurt us, but I was impressed with how we played. It just stinks the way it ended. But I think playing a game is going to calm us down the more we compete. We had a lot of doubters. Now that we competed here today it should help us the rest of the season.”
The Redhawks had more chances in the first half, but they were unable to finish. West Aurora kept battling until they got a good one with 1:53 remaining before halftime when Stephens connected with Olivia McPherson from about 20 yards.
McPherson quickly gained possession, turned and fired the shot for the team’s first goal of 2019 and a 1-0 advantage.
“Audrey came on the left side and crossed it with her left foot,” McPherson said. “I was open on back post, and I was able to just finish it with my left. It was a nice send.”
It was a difficult chance to finish, but McPherson turned it into a thing of beauty, and one that Stephens said the team will need to do more of this spring if they expect to beat teams of the caliber of Naperville Central
“We just need to finish our chances when we get them,” Stephens said. “Against teams like these we aren’t going to get that many chances so we have to take advantage of them if we get them.”
Unfortunately for the Blackhawks (0-1-0), that was the only one they could finish from the six shots they mustered.
“I think we did some nice things and with my sister out (Kiara McPherson) now, we adjusted really well,” Olivia McPherson said. “We controlled the ball a lot on the wing. Sarai (Munoz) and Yuvia (Ontiveros) stepped up a lot and controlled the ball. I think we looked a lot better than I thought we would, and we can grow and improve each day and that’s what we want to do.”
Last year, Naperville Central also won this opener but by a 2-0 score.
“We just wanted to get the first game under our belt and work together as a team,” Stephens said. “We have a lot of new players who have to step up into some position because of what we lost from last year. But overall I was happy with how we competed hard, we played well and we saw a lot of good things for our next couple of games.”
For the Redhawks, they’re hopeful this is just the beginning of a season filled with a lot more scoring than usual, or at least enough so that they win far more than they lose.
“We want to keep improving each game, especially with the DVC,” Epelbaum said. “A lot of the time it comes down to how you did during the season as a whole, not just those last couple of games, so it’s really important for us to get stronger sooner than just at the end of the season.”
Starting lineups
Naperville Central
GK Amber Hunter
D Grace Anderson
D Caroline Giannone
D Abbey Hillman
D Emma Irle
MF Makenna Dickerson
MF Sullivan Schubel
MF Maddie Mills
F Caroline Reedy
F Alyssa Lanzon
F Sarah Scoles
West Aurora
GK Brisa Solis
D Isela Chavez
D Krystal Diaz
D Laeticia Mbende
D Mackenzie Thompson
MF Sarai Munoz
MF Olivia McPherson
MF Yuvia Ontiveros
F Gracie Prather
F Audrey Stephens
F Nancy Villanueva
Chicagoland Soccer MVP of the Match: Sophie Epelbaum, jr., GK, Naperville Central
Scoring summary
First half
West Aurora – Olivia McPherson (Audrey Stephens) 1:53
Second half
Naperville Central – Maddie Mills (Abbey Hillman) 10:31
Naperville Central – Abbey Hillman (u/a) 2:34
Redhawks' Hillman notches game-winner with 2:34 remaining
By Chris Walker
AURORA – Sophie Epelbaum had barely settled in as goalkeeper to begin the second half of Monday’s season opener for Naperville Central before she was seriously tested.
The junior didn’t realize it at the time but her save not even four minutes after the start of the second half kept the Redhawks in the game. Later they rallied to not just tie to game, but earn the game-winner on the road. Abbey Hillman's tally in the final minutes led Naperville Central to a dramatic 2-1 win.
“I’m very pleased that we found two, because we didn’t have many games last year that we had more than one goal. So that’s a good sign,” Redhawks coach Ed Watson said. “A couple of seniors found the back of the net, which is good. And it could’ve been 2-0 if it wasn’t for Sophie (Epelbaum) making that big save. If (West Aurora) goes up 2-0 five minutes into the second half, we’re in a lot of trouble. So she made that big save and then we went with the adjustments we had just talked about at halftime.”
Senior Maddie Mills scored from Hillman with 10:31 left to play to break the shutout and knot the score at 1-1.
It remained that way until a West Aurora defender was unable to clear the ball and Hillman pounced on the opportunity lofting a shot that West Aurora sophomore goalkeeper Brisa Solias was unable to come up with with 2:34 left to play.
“It just kind of bounced out of the box after it came off a defender,” Hillman said. “I feel like you should get the ball back in there when that happens and just do the best you can to get the goal because you never know what’s going to happen.”
And just like that, Naperville Central, a program which has struggled in putting the ball in the back of the net in recent seasons, is on pace to score 42 goals this year.
“That would shatter what we’ve done the last few years,” Watson said. “We’ll take it.”
The Redhawks (1-0-0) have scored 31 goals each of the past two seasons, but that number includes big offensive games against one team. If you remove those blowout games, they have scored just 47 goals in 45 games over the past two seasons. They scored 47 in 2016 alone.
“We made some adjustments at halftime, and I thought the girls, as the game wore on, started to recognize that there was some advantage in the adjustments we made,” Watson said. “Credit to them to realize that if certain things aren’t working, we’ve got to make some changes. I think we had better opportunities in the second half. We probably possessed the ball better in the first half, but we had better opportunities in the second half.”
They created 18 shots overall so they were certainly busy creating chances. It just took longer than Watson had hoped for them to finally finish.
“I’m very happy to be walking out of here with a win,” he said. “That’s for sure.”
Naperville Central, ranked no. 33 in Chicagoland Soccer’s First 50 poll, returned 17 players so expectations are high, especially since they had a nice postseason run last spring.
“We maximized our time outside in the cold (in preseason practice), so we were really excited for this game today,” Hillman said. “I think we did a good job of ball movement as a team, especially for the first game. We need to work on communication between the backline and the forwards with moving and stuff, but I think this was a good team effort, but we will have to work on continuing to get better.”
Epelbaum, who played the second half after senior Amber Hunter worked the first, liked how her team didn’t freak out when it went down 1-0 early, and that they kept fighting to score the game-winner rather than simply being satisfied with the late goal to tie the game.
For her big save early in the second half and her strong play throughout the remainder of said half, Epelbaum earned the Chicagoland Soccer MVP of the Match honor.
“I was really glad that we were able to keep our spirit up and really work for the win in the end,” she said. “I was really impressed with our technical stuff. A lot of the girls were good at their feet, making good touches. And we made a lot of smart decisions. I think our transitions were a little too slow getting back to defense and communicating between offense and defense, but overall I was really impressed with us.”
West Aurora’s inability to hold onto a lead and then surrender the go-ahead goal when the game appeared destined to end in a draw certainly put a damper on the opener for the Blackhawks.
What it didn’t do was make coach Laura Wagley forget about what she witnessed in the first half, because it was something she hadn’t seen before. Sure, she’d seen her team lead at the half plenty of times before, but this was something more.
“At halftime I told them that in my 10 years that was the best first half I’ve seen out of any team that I’ve had,” she said. “We came out strong. We played aggressive. We were confident, and we were ready to go, and I think Naperville Central is a great team.”
While the loss will sting, albeit briefly, Wagley thinks that so much that transpired throughout the afternoon will have a positive impact, especially on the girls playing unfamiliar roles and those who are new, including on the backline and goal line, which are truly inexperienced.
“We knew going in that our offense would be really good but our defense is so young back there with a brand new sweeper (freshman Krystal Diaz) and a new goalie (Solis). So we know if we get the ball on offense we’ll be just fine, but our defense might take some time.”
With more experience, the Redhawks had the advantage of depth in this one.
“They can sub all day, and I cannot do that,” Wagley said. “And having Kiara (McPherson) out really hurt us, but I was impressed with how we played. It just stinks the way it ended. But I think playing a game is going to calm us down the more we compete. We had a lot of doubters. Now that we competed here today it should help us the rest of the season.”
The Redhawks had more chances in the first half, but they were unable to finish. West Aurora kept battling until they got a good one with 1:53 remaining before halftime when Stephens connected with Olivia McPherson from about 20 yards.
McPherson quickly gained possession, turned and fired the shot for the team’s first goal of 2019 and a 1-0 advantage.
“Audrey came on the left side and crossed it with her left foot,” McPherson said. “I was open on back post, and I was able to just finish it with my left. It was a nice send.”
It was a difficult chance to finish, but McPherson turned it into a thing of beauty, and one that Stephens said the team will need to do more of this spring if they expect to beat teams of the caliber of Naperville Central
“We just need to finish our chances when we get them,” Stephens said. “Against teams like these we aren’t going to get that many chances so we have to take advantage of them if we get them.”
Unfortunately for the Blackhawks (0-1-0), that was the only one they could finish from the six shots they mustered.
“I think we did some nice things and with my sister out (Kiara McPherson) now, we adjusted really well,” Olivia McPherson said. “We controlled the ball a lot on the wing. Sarai (Munoz) and Yuvia (Ontiveros) stepped up a lot and controlled the ball. I think we looked a lot better than I thought we would, and we can grow and improve each day and that’s what we want to do.”
Last year, Naperville Central also won this opener but by a 2-0 score.
“We just wanted to get the first game under our belt and work together as a team,” Stephens said. “We have a lot of new players who have to step up into some position because of what we lost from last year. But overall I was happy with how we competed hard, we played well and we saw a lot of good things for our next couple of games.”
For the Redhawks, they’re hopeful this is just the beginning of a season filled with a lot more scoring than usual, or at least enough so that they win far more than they lose.
“We want to keep improving each game, especially with the DVC,” Epelbaum said. “A lot of the time it comes down to how you did during the season as a whole, not just those last couple of games, so it’s really important for us to get stronger sooner than just at the end of the season.”
Starting lineups
Naperville Central
GK Amber Hunter
D Grace Anderson
D Caroline Giannone
D Abbey Hillman
D Emma Irle
MF Makenna Dickerson
MF Sullivan Schubel
MF Maddie Mills
F Caroline Reedy
F Alyssa Lanzon
F Sarah Scoles
West Aurora
GK Brisa Solis
D Isela Chavez
D Krystal Diaz
D Laeticia Mbende
D Mackenzie Thompson
MF Sarai Munoz
MF Olivia McPherson
MF Yuvia Ontiveros
F Gracie Prather
F Audrey Stephens
F Nancy Villanueva
Chicagoland Soccer MVP of the Match: Sophie Epelbaum, jr., GK, Naperville Central
Scoring summary
First half
West Aurora – Olivia McPherson (Audrey Stephens) 1:53
Second half
Naperville Central – Maddie Mills (Abbey Hillman) 10:31
Naperville Central – Abbey Hillman (u/a) 2:34