North edges Central in all-Naperville final
Smith’s 79th-minute PK gives Huskies tournament title
By Matt Le Cren
NAPERVILLE – Most players dream of scoring a game-winning goal.
That’s especially true when the opponent is unbeaten.
Zach Smith did it twice Saturday.
The Naperville North senior was the difference-maker as the Huskies knocked off Benet and Naperville Central to win the Best of the West Tournament for the fifth-consecutive year.
Smith tallied the game-winner late in a 2-1 win over Benet in the morning, which allowed Naperville North to win its pool despite Thursday’s 2-1 loss to Geneva.
Then in the championship game, Naperville Central was called for a hand ball in the penalty box with 1:25 remaining and the game tied 1-1.
Smith stepped to the spot knowing the game was on his foot. Was he nervous?
Nah. He was right where he wanted to be.
“The first thought is, well, this is a storybook, this is what it comes down to,” Smith said. “It’s a huge moment. But (putting it in the) back of the net is all I care about.”
Smith did exactly that, ripping the penalty shot into the lower right corner of the net to give his team a 2-1 lead. Soon after, the team was celebrating another Best of the West tournament championship.
This title was particularly sweet for the Huskies, who won just one of their first five matches, and relieved some of the angst that had built up over the past 10 days.
“It’s a process,” Smith said. “We obviously struggled early this season. We struggled on Thursday against Geneva, so to come out this morning and beat Benet, which is a phenomenal team, and to carry on tonight, is great.
“I think we’re getting back to what we’re good at and definitely the momentum is going, and I wouldn’t count us out at all.”
Naperville North coach Jim Konrad never counts his players out, but he was more than a little dissatisfied with his team’s recent play. He felt better after Saturday’s action.
“I’m super proud of the boys,” Konrad said. “The boys owed it to themselves and the school to play the way they did today.
“They have not been playing the way they should be, and so today they had to take a few shots in the mouth. We knew we’ve got a good group and today, both this morning and this afternoon, they showed it.
“The guys that I needed to be great and I had been disappointed with the first few games of the year really stepped up today.”
Smith and Ohio State recruit Ty Konrad, who scored the first goal against Benet, stepped up to lead North’s attack against Naperville Central. They regularly put pressure on the Redhawks’ defense with their lightning-quick attacks up the middle and left wing, where freshman Alex Barger also caused havoc with his speed.
It paid off in creating the decisive penalty kick. Smith and Ty Konrad rushed up the center of the field against two defenders. Smith carried the ball to the top of the box and slid the ball toward Konrad, who was on the left.
But before the ball reached Konrad, it deflected off a defender’s arm inside the 18, resulting in the penalty.
“They played a lousy ball back to their center back,” Smith said. “He didn’t get a good touch on it.
“The ball was in open space, so it’s all me at that point. I took off with it and as they started closing in, I saw Ty on the far side.
“He had a better angle than I did so I played it to him, and it hit the defender. It ended up getting a win for us.”
Naperville Central coach Troy Adams said it was unfortunate that the match was decided by the handball, which he thought was inadvertent. But he agreed the Huskies (3-2-2) earned their victory.
“I don’t think that handball had any impact,” Adams said. “It’s one of those things where the ball played the elbow, and it was against his body.
“But North played better than we did tonight. They played harder; they played stronger.
“They managed to get the ball in behind us, which caused us a lot of issues. They created a lot of 50-50 opportunities that they won and when you do that, you’re going to win a lot of games.”
Wins have been tougher to come by for the Huskies, who finally played a good all-around game. They might not have hit on all cylinders, wasting several good scoring chances, but they avoided the backfires that had slowed their progress.
“I thought my nephew, Ty, was an all-American all day today,” Jim Konrad said. “He was a one-man wrecking crew, beating four or five guys, running down the balls, giving them fits. He was probably the biggest reason we won today.
“Zach Smith up-top did a fantastic job with that run he made. He scored both game-winners.
“Nata (Rojas) and Cesar (Recendez) in the middle of the field were really special. I thought we had so much trouble last week sorting out runners. Those guys were fantastic.”
And then there was senior Ali Khorfan. The four-year varsity veteran gave the Huskies a 1-0 lead when he scored his first goal in two seasons at the 33:31 mark of the second half.
Khorfan settled a deflected ball just outside the box and ripped a 20-yard shot inside the near post.
“Great goal,” Smith said. “It was a great strike on his part.”
Khorfan scored three goals his freshman year and had one as a sophomore before being shut out last season.
“It was a big slope and then we went down,” Khorfan said. “And now we’re coming back up.”
While Khorfan hasn’t been a prolific scorer, he has been a stalwart starter throughout North’s championship run. He has been overshadowed by older, more accomplished teammates, but he doesn’t mind.
“People look at statistics, and that’s not all that matters,” Khorfan said. “You’ve got to watch the game and analyze and see what players did this and what players did that.
“You know, I don’t really care about the credit. I just do it for the team.
“I work hard for them, and all I care about is winning and making my coaches happy and making the fans happy.”
Khorfan, of course, was happy to score against Naperville Central, especially in a Best of the West final at Memorial Stadium, the Redhawks’ home turf.
“I’ve hit some in games before, and I haven’t had luck and then in this one I just hit it,” Khorfan said. “It hits a defender, and it goes in.
“It’s great. I love playing Central.
“It’s a huge school rivalry, and it makes it great. I know a couple players from their team, so always getting that little smirk at the end feels good.”
That smirk had been absent as the Huskies struggled at the start of the season despite fielding eight returning starters. They have had to adjust without 6-foot-8 goalie Tom Welch and 6-5 center back Colin Iverson, who gave them a huge height advantage as well as a talent edge.
Those two have graduated, but North’s opponents don’t care who wears the orange and blue. For them, beating the Huskies makes their season.
“We lost two key players,” Khorfan said. “Tommy and Colin were almost everything to us, so we’ve just got to remodel.
“We’ve got a lot of players who play together in club. We’ve known each other since we were little, and our communication is starting to go up.
“We’ve got to match the intensity (of opponents). In the first few games we didn’t do that. We were too confident in ourselves, and today we really stepped up against Benet and Central.”
Naperville Central (5-1-1) has stepped up and is one win short of its 2018 victory total. The Redhawks had won five straight before losing to North.
“We’ve played very well in the opening six games,” Adams said. “We had stretches tonight where I thought we played very well.
“But we’re not especially large this year, and they were very physical. Every time we touched the ball there was somebody right on our back bumping us or nudging us.
“Unfortunately, we didn’t play strong enough today to counter that.”
The Redhawks managed only two shots, but the second gave them something to cheer about.
Sophomore Benjamin Tietjen tallied his first varsity goal with a brilliant strike from 27 yards on the left wing to tie the game with 14:19 to go.
The play began with a corner kick from the right side. The ball eventually ended up in the left corner, where defender Seth Lendzion corralled it and passed it back to Tietjen, who ripped a line drive inside the upper right corner.
“He composed himself and you can hit those if you have enough composure,” Adams said. “I don’t think he absolutely tried to crush it.
“It’s like golf. Those guys who hit the ball a mile aren’t always 6-3, 210.
“It’s the form and the follow-through. I think in that case he had great form, great follow-through, put his foot through the ball and his body motion carried him through, which allowed it to stay down.”
Starting lineups
Naperville North
GK Jason Barba
D Evan Thompson
D Josh Kaufman
D Christian Romano
D Sebastian Babayan
M Nata Rojas
M Cesar Recendez
M Alex Barger
M Ali Khorfan
F Zach Smith
F Ty Konrad
Naperville Central
GK Caden Redpath
D Mitch Becker
D Seth Lendzion
D Mateo Lopez
M Rohan Bhargava
M Benjamin Tietjen
M Johnny Kim
M Owen Jarrell
F Roman Krupka
F Nico Couropmitree
F James Kim
Chicagoland Soccer Man of the Match: Zach Smith, sr., F, Naperville North
Scoring summary
First half
No scoring
Second half
Naperville North – Ali Khorfan 33:31
Naperville Central – Ben Tietjen (Seth Lendzion) 14:19
Naperville North – Zach Smith (PK) 1:25
Smith’s 79th-minute PK gives Huskies tournament title
By Matt Le Cren
NAPERVILLE – Most players dream of scoring a game-winning goal.
That’s especially true when the opponent is unbeaten.
Zach Smith did it twice Saturday.
The Naperville North senior was the difference-maker as the Huskies knocked off Benet and Naperville Central to win the Best of the West Tournament for the fifth-consecutive year.
Smith tallied the game-winner late in a 2-1 win over Benet in the morning, which allowed Naperville North to win its pool despite Thursday’s 2-1 loss to Geneva.
Then in the championship game, Naperville Central was called for a hand ball in the penalty box with 1:25 remaining and the game tied 1-1.
Smith stepped to the spot knowing the game was on his foot. Was he nervous?
Nah. He was right where he wanted to be.
“The first thought is, well, this is a storybook, this is what it comes down to,” Smith said. “It’s a huge moment. But (putting it in the) back of the net is all I care about.”
Smith did exactly that, ripping the penalty shot into the lower right corner of the net to give his team a 2-1 lead. Soon after, the team was celebrating another Best of the West tournament championship.
This title was particularly sweet for the Huskies, who won just one of their first five matches, and relieved some of the angst that had built up over the past 10 days.
“It’s a process,” Smith said. “We obviously struggled early this season. We struggled on Thursday against Geneva, so to come out this morning and beat Benet, which is a phenomenal team, and to carry on tonight, is great.
“I think we’re getting back to what we’re good at and definitely the momentum is going, and I wouldn’t count us out at all.”
Naperville North coach Jim Konrad never counts his players out, but he was more than a little dissatisfied with his team’s recent play. He felt better after Saturday’s action.
“I’m super proud of the boys,” Konrad said. “The boys owed it to themselves and the school to play the way they did today.
“They have not been playing the way they should be, and so today they had to take a few shots in the mouth. We knew we’ve got a good group and today, both this morning and this afternoon, they showed it.
“The guys that I needed to be great and I had been disappointed with the first few games of the year really stepped up today.”
Smith and Ohio State recruit Ty Konrad, who scored the first goal against Benet, stepped up to lead North’s attack against Naperville Central. They regularly put pressure on the Redhawks’ defense with their lightning-quick attacks up the middle and left wing, where freshman Alex Barger also caused havoc with his speed.
It paid off in creating the decisive penalty kick. Smith and Ty Konrad rushed up the center of the field against two defenders. Smith carried the ball to the top of the box and slid the ball toward Konrad, who was on the left.
But before the ball reached Konrad, it deflected off a defender’s arm inside the 18, resulting in the penalty.
“They played a lousy ball back to their center back,” Smith said. “He didn’t get a good touch on it.
“The ball was in open space, so it’s all me at that point. I took off with it and as they started closing in, I saw Ty on the far side.
“He had a better angle than I did so I played it to him, and it hit the defender. It ended up getting a win for us.”
Naperville Central coach Troy Adams said it was unfortunate that the match was decided by the handball, which he thought was inadvertent. But he agreed the Huskies (3-2-2) earned their victory.
“I don’t think that handball had any impact,” Adams said. “It’s one of those things where the ball played the elbow, and it was against his body.
“But North played better than we did tonight. They played harder; they played stronger.
“They managed to get the ball in behind us, which caused us a lot of issues. They created a lot of 50-50 opportunities that they won and when you do that, you’re going to win a lot of games.”
Wins have been tougher to come by for the Huskies, who finally played a good all-around game. They might not have hit on all cylinders, wasting several good scoring chances, but they avoided the backfires that had slowed their progress.
“I thought my nephew, Ty, was an all-American all day today,” Jim Konrad said. “He was a one-man wrecking crew, beating four or five guys, running down the balls, giving them fits. He was probably the biggest reason we won today.
“Zach Smith up-top did a fantastic job with that run he made. He scored both game-winners.
“Nata (Rojas) and Cesar (Recendez) in the middle of the field were really special. I thought we had so much trouble last week sorting out runners. Those guys were fantastic.”
And then there was senior Ali Khorfan. The four-year varsity veteran gave the Huskies a 1-0 lead when he scored his first goal in two seasons at the 33:31 mark of the second half.
Khorfan settled a deflected ball just outside the box and ripped a 20-yard shot inside the near post.
“Great goal,” Smith said. “It was a great strike on his part.”
Khorfan scored three goals his freshman year and had one as a sophomore before being shut out last season.
“It was a big slope and then we went down,” Khorfan said. “And now we’re coming back up.”
While Khorfan hasn’t been a prolific scorer, he has been a stalwart starter throughout North’s championship run. He has been overshadowed by older, more accomplished teammates, but he doesn’t mind.
“People look at statistics, and that’s not all that matters,” Khorfan said. “You’ve got to watch the game and analyze and see what players did this and what players did that.
“You know, I don’t really care about the credit. I just do it for the team.
“I work hard for them, and all I care about is winning and making my coaches happy and making the fans happy.”
Khorfan, of course, was happy to score against Naperville Central, especially in a Best of the West final at Memorial Stadium, the Redhawks’ home turf.
“I’ve hit some in games before, and I haven’t had luck and then in this one I just hit it,” Khorfan said. “It hits a defender, and it goes in.
“It’s great. I love playing Central.
“It’s a huge school rivalry, and it makes it great. I know a couple players from their team, so always getting that little smirk at the end feels good.”
That smirk had been absent as the Huskies struggled at the start of the season despite fielding eight returning starters. They have had to adjust without 6-foot-8 goalie Tom Welch and 6-5 center back Colin Iverson, who gave them a huge height advantage as well as a talent edge.
Those two have graduated, but North’s opponents don’t care who wears the orange and blue. For them, beating the Huskies makes their season.
“We lost two key players,” Khorfan said. “Tommy and Colin were almost everything to us, so we’ve just got to remodel.
“We’ve got a lot of players who play together in club. We’ve known each other since we were little, and our communication is starting to go up.
“We’ve got to match the intensity (of opponents). In the first few games we didn’t do that. We were too confident in ourselves, and today we really stepped up against Benet and Central.”
Naperville Central (5-1-1) has stepped up and is one win short of its 2018 victory total. The Redhawks had won five straight before losing to North.
“We’ve played very well in the opening six games,” Adams said. “We had stretches tonight where I thought we played very well.
“But we’re not especially large this year, and they were very physical. Every time we touched the ball there was somebody right on our back bumping us or nudging us.
“Unfortunately, we didn’t play strong enough today to counter that.”
The Redhawks managed only two shots, but the second gave them something to cheer about.
Sophomore Benjamin Tietjen tallied his first varsity goal with a brilliant strike from 27 yards on the left wing to tie the game with 14:19 to go.
The play began with a corner kick from the right side. The ball eventually ended up in the left corner, where defender Seth Lendzion corralled it and passed it back to Tietjen, who ripped a line drive inside the upper right corner.
“He composed himself and you can hit those if you have enough composure,” Adams said. “I don’t think he absolutely tried to crush it.
“It’s like golf. Those guys who hit the ball a mile aren’t always 6-3, 210.
“It’s the form and the follow-through. I think in that case he had great form, great follow-through, put his foot through the ball and his body motion carried him through, which allowed it to stay down.”
Starting lineups
Naperville North
GK Jason Barba
D Evan Thompson
D Josh Kaufman
D Christian Romano
D Sebastian Babayan
M Nata Rojas
M Cesar Recendez
M Alex Barger
M Ali Khorfan
F Zach Smith
F Ty Konrad
Naperville Central
GK Caden Redpath
D Mitch Becker
D Seth Lendzion
D Mateo Lopez
M Rohan Bhargava
M Benjamin Tietjen
M Johnny Kim
M Owen Jarrell
F Roman Krupka
F Nico Couropmitree
F James Kim
Chicagoland Soccer Man of the Match: Zach Smith, sr., F, Naperville North
Scoring summary
First half
No scoring
Second half
Naperville North – Ali Khorfan 33:31
Naperville Central – Ben Tietjen (Seth Lendzion) 14:19
Naperville North – Zach Smith (PK) 1:25