Senior-frosh combo gives Lemont
revenge win against Reavis
Freshman Tucker continues hot streak in 2-0 win
By Steve Millar
LEMONT – The first half strike came from a senior who scored his first career goal. The second half goal came from a freshman who may be getting an early start to piling up impressive career numbers.
Senior midfielder Sebastian Delatorre and freshman forward Brett Tucker are on very different scoring journeys in their soccer careers, but both converged Tuesday night with goals that lifted host Lemont to a 2-0 win over Reavis in a South Suburban Conference cross-over match.
Lemont (9-3-2, 4-2-2 Blue Division) lost to Reavis (4-7-1, 1-4-1 Red Division) in a shootout in the Windy City Ram Classic quarterfinals on Aug. 27.
Lemont coach Rick Prangen encouraged his players to revel in the rematch win.
“One thing I want these guys to be able to do is celebrate victories,” Prangen said. “We had a good win Saturday (over Downers Grove North), and it was kind of just a ho-hum thing. I want these guys to embrace the victory.
“It should feel good. This is a team that knocked us out of a tournament, and we came back and beat them. So we should enjoy this one.”
With his team leading 1-0 at halftime but surrendering a howling wind advantage, Prangen was a bit concerned.
Tucker, though, provided his team with a level of comfort when he took a pass from Marek Skotnicki, got behind the Reavis defense and slipped a shot under charging goalkeeper Bart Obrochta to make it 2-0 with 18:20 to go.
“Luciano (Mancini) passed it to Marek,” Tucker said. “Marek saw me open. I ran, took it to goal and just shot.”
It was the third goal in two games for Tucker, the Chicagoland Soccer Man of the Match.
First, Tucker earned his spot on the varsity; now, he is working his way into the starting lineup.
“It’s going good,” Tucker said. “In summer practices, I was talking to all the coaches, and I got to do a varsity practice. I showed out. I got to be on varsity.
“I had a slow start to the season. Then I got my first goal, and the next game I got another goal. I had a week break where I didn’t score, then Saturday I had two goals and another one (Tuesday). So, I’m feeling much better about it lately.”
So is Prangen, who is watching his now five-goal scorer blossom into a dangerous player.
“Brett’s coming around right now and becoming the player we were hoping we were going to have at the beginning of the year,” Prangen said. “He’s starting to become that guy. His transition is that he’s probably always been one of the biggest, fastest, strongest kids in his age group. It’s not that way out here (with varsity).
“So, we’re hoping that we’re getting his game up a bit, getting his IQ up as far as knowing when to move, when to run. When he does things quickly, he can be a good player.”
Prangen was also pleased with the way his team responded against the wind in the second half.
“I was really happy the first 10 minutes of the second half, because I could see we weren’t going to just sit back there and absorb that pressure,” Prangen said. “That was one of my fears. You get in that mentality that you have to bunker in. We kept going forward.”
On the flip side, Reavis was disappointed it was not able to get back into the game over the final 40 minutes after battling hard to hold Lemont to one in a first half that saw the home team on the attack most of the way with the wind in its sails.
“I thought we would have created more chances in the second half,” Reavis coach Mark Gniadek said. “Lemont had a really good game-plan. They cut off our angles really well.
“We tried to knock it around. When they don’t bite they don’t get stretched out. It’s hard to break them down. They did a really good job defending, especially when we had the wind in the second half.”
Reavis’ best chances came on shots from 20 yards by Julian Menchaca and Emanuel Montero that were saved by Lemont goalkeeper Amir Biba.
Obrochta made six saves for the Rams.
The game continued a disturbing trend for Reavis, which finished fourth in its 32-team tournament. The Rams have scored just three goals in their last six games (1-5-0).
“There just has to be someone that steps up and puts it in the back of the net, and we’ll get a big spark when that happens,” Gniadek said. “I have a feeling that as soon as we start getting one, one’s going to turn into two and two will turn into three. Getting that first one will be really important for us.”
Lemont's Biba made four saves to record the shutout and got plenty of help from Mancini, Adam Briestensky, Aidan Ontiveros and Ben Kittridge on his backline.
Lemont played without defensive stalwart Lucas Urban.
“Lucas has played almost every single minute for us before this game,” Prangen said. “I thought Adam Briestensky played brilliant as a center back, and he hasn’t played there at all. Luciano did a great job, Aidan and Ben have been so consistent for us all season. Those guys were all brilliant.”
Delatorre, meanwhile, got it all started for Lemont when he came off the bench and almost immediately scored his first career goal.
Billy Eliadis took a corner kick in the 26th minute and sent a cross into the box where Alex Gaberek got a head on it, flicking it toward the goal. Delatorre leaped to head it home.
“I kind of read that it was going back post,” Delatorre said. “I knew if I could position myself correctly that I could get a second ball. Luckily it came to me. It could have gone over me.
“When you have the chance, you’ve got to make the most of the opportunities.”
While Lemont looked to celebrate its win, Reavis was set to get back to work on trying to follow Delatorre’s advice on making opportunities count.
“I think we can pick it up,” Reavis sophomore defender Krystian Paluch said. “I think we can beat all the teams the rest of our conference season. We just can’t give up.
“We have to get a win, and then we can turn it around. We have to keep fighting and keep our heads up.”
Starting lineups
Reavis
GK: Bart Obrochta
D: Julian Menchaca
D: Krystian Paluch
D: Steven Solis
D: Uriel Urbina
MF: Emanuel Montero
MF: Carlos Ramos
MF: Galileo Figueroa
MF: Diego Ochoa
F: Diego Corona
F: William Solis
Lemont
GK: Amir Biba
D: Luciano Mancini
D: Adam Briestensky
D: Aidan Ontiveros
D: Ben Kittridge
MF: Tyler Chrisman
MF: Billy Eliadis
MF: Ali Nabulsi
MF: Marek Skotnicki
F: Brett Tucker
F: Lukas Rabianski
Chicagoland Soccer Man of the Match:
Brett Tucker, fr., F, Lemont
Scoring Summary
First half
Lemont: Delatorre (Gaberek), 26’
Second half
Lemont: Tucker (Skotnicki), 62’
revenge win against Reavis
Freshman Tucker continues hot streak in 2-0 win
By Steve Millar
LEMONT – The first half strike came from a senior who scored his first career goal. The second half goal came from a freshman who may be getting an early start to piling up impressive career numbers.
Senior midfielder Sebastian Delatorre and freshman forward Brett Tucker are on very different scoring journeys in their soccer careers, but both converged Tuesday night with goals that lifted host Lemont to a 2-0 win over Reavis in a South Suburban Conference cross-over match.
Lemont (9-3-2, 4-2-2 Blue Division) lost to Reavis (4-7-1, 1-4-1 Red Division) in a shootout in the Windy City Ram Classic quarterfinals on Aug. 27.
Lemont coach Rick Prangen encouraged his players to revel in the rematch win.
“One thing I want these guys to be able to do is celebrate victories,” Prangen said. “We had a good win Saturday (over Downers Grove North), and it was kind of just a ho-hum thing. I want these guys to embrace the victory.
“It should feel good. This is a team that knocked us out of a tournament, and we came back and beat them. So we should enjoy this one.”
With his team leading 1-0 at halftime but surrendering a howling wind advantage, Prangen was a bit concerned.
Tucker, though, provided his team with a level of comfort when he took a pass from Marek Skotnicki, got behind the Reavis defense and slipped a shot under charging goalkeeper Bart Obrochta to make it 2-0 with 18:20 to go.
“Luciano (Mancini) passed it to Marek,” Tucker said. “Marek saw me open. I ran, took it to goal and just shot.”
It was the third goal in two games for Tucker, the Chicagoland Soccer Man of the Match.
First, Tucker earned his spot on the varsity; now, he is working his way into the starting lineup.
“It’s going good,” Tucker said. “In summer practices, I was talking to all the coaches, and I got to do a varsity practice. I showed out. I got to be on varsity.
“I had a slow start to the season. Then I got my first goal, and the next game I got another goal. I had a week break where I didn’t score, then Saturday I had two goals and another one (Tuesday). So, I’m feeling much better about it lately.”
So is Prangen, who is watching his now five-goal scorer blossom into a dangerous player.
“Brett’s coming around right now and becoming the player we were hoping we were going to have at the beginning of the year,” Prangen said. “He’s starting to become that guy. His transition is that he’s probably always been one of the biggest, fastest, strongest kids in his age group. It’s not that way out here (with varsity).
“So, we’re hoping that we’re getting his game up a bit, getting his IQ up as far as knowing when to move, when to run. When he does things quickly, he can be a good player.”
Prangen was also pleased with the way his team responded against the wind in the second half.
“I was really happy the first 10 minutes of the second half, because I could see we weren’t going to just sit back there and absorb that pressure,” Prangen said. “That was one of my fears. You get in that mentality that you have to bunker in. We kept going forward.”
On the flip side, Reavis was disappointed it was not able to get back into the game over the final 40 minutes after battling hard to hold Lemont to one in a first half that saw the home team on the attack most of the way with the wind in its sails.
“I thought we would have created more chances in the second half,” Reavis coach Mark Gniadek said. “Lemont had a really good game-plan. They cut off our angles really well.
“We tried to knock it around. When they don’t bite they don’t get stretched out. It’s hard to break them down. They did a really good job defending, especially when we had the wind in the second half.”
Reavis’ best chances came on shots from 20 yards by Julian Menchaca and Emanuel Montero that were saved by Lemont goalkeeper Amir Biba.
Obrochta made six saves for the Rams.
The game continued a disturbing trend for Reavis, which finished fourth in its 32-team tournament. The Rams have scored just three goals in their last six games (1-5-0).
“There just has to be someone that steps up and puts it in the back of the net, and we’ll get a big spark when that happens,” Gniadek said. “I have a feeling that as soon as we start getting one, one’s going to turn into two and two will turn into three. Getting that first one will be really important for us.”
Lemont's Biba made four saves to record the shutout and got plenty of help from Mancini, Adam Briestensky, Aidan Ontiveros and Ben Kittridge on his backline.
Lemont played without defensive stalwart Lucas Urban.
“Lucas has played almost every single minute for us before this game,” Prangen said. “I thought Adam Briestensky played brilliant as a center back, and he hasn’t played there at all. Luciano did a great job, Aidan and Ben have been so consistent for us all season. Those guys were all brilliant.”
Delatorre, meanwhile, got it all started for Lemont when he came off the bench and almost immediately scored his first career goal.
Billy Eliadis took a corner kick in the 26th minute and sent a cross into the box where Alex Gaberek got a head on it, flicking it toward the goal. Delatorre leaped to head it home.
“I kind of read that it was going back post,” Delatorre said. “I knew if I could position myself correctly that I could get a second ball. Luckily it came to me. It could have gone over me.
“When you have the chance, you’ve got to make the most of the opportunities.”
While Lemont looked to celebrate its win, Reavis was set to get back to work on trying to follow Delatorre’s advice on making opportunities count.
“I think we can pick it up,” Reavis sophomore defender Krystian Paluch said. “I think we can beat all the teams the rest of our conference season. We just can’t give up.
“We have to get a win, and then we can turn it around. We have to keep fighting and keep our heads up.”
Starting lineups
Reavis
GK: Bart Obrochta
D: Julian Menchaca
D: Krystian Paluch
D: Steven Solis
D: Uriel Urbina
MF: Emanuel Montero
MF: Carlos Ramos
MF: Galileo Figueroa
MF: Diego Ochoa
F: Diego Corona
F: William Solis
Lemont
GK: Amir Biba
D: Luciano Mancini
D: Adam Briestensky
D: Aidan Ontiveros
D: Ben Kittridge
MF: Tyler Chrisman
MF: Billy Eliadis
MF: Ali Nabulsi
MF: Marek Skotnicki
F: Brett Tucker
F: Lukas Rabianski
Chicagoland Soccer Man of the Match:
Brett Tucker, fr., F, Lemont
Scoring Summary
First half
Lemont: Delatorre (Gaberek), 26’
Second half
Lemont: Tucker (Skotnicki), 62’