North Shore Country Day no match
for battled-tested University
Host Raiders fall in 1st game since opening day
By Michael Wojtychiw
WINNETKA -- This spring season has thrown everyone's schedules off. With the weather going from beautiful to frigid, windy to downpour rain to snow it’s been difficult to get games in. Spring breaks and holidays add to the problem. Teams have struggled at times to play.
And then there’s North Shore Country Day.
After playing on the first day of the season, March 14, the Raiders did not play again until Thursday, 31 days later. The long unexpected break in matches came due to an extended spring break, two cancellations, a rescheduled league match and a league opponent cancelling its season.
So, it was really a second season-opener when North Shore Country Day hosted University (Chicago) in the Raiders’ Independent School League opener Thursday on the school's campus field.
Unfortunately for the hosts, University’s strong play and the long layoff were too much in a 9-0 loss.
"A game after any long stretch of time is tough and playing a team as strong as U-High makes it even more challenging," said North Shore Country Day assistant coach Rebekah Kauffman, who filled in for manager Lizzy Giffen. "For us, we knew it was going to be a tough game. We did our best with what we had and we competed. That's all we can ask for.
"Moving forward we have a number of areas we have to work on, and we'll do that. On to the next game."
University (5-2-1, 2-0-0) got off to a quick start, scoring in the fourth, 11th and 12th minutes on goals from Carly Penn, Charlotte Sims and Lucy Aronsohn.
The visitors' relentless attack continued to pour on the goals in the 18th minute, when a corner by Penn bounced off of North Shore Country Day keeper Peyton Hudson into the goal.
"What we talked about with the girls is the full effort they had," University manager Joshua Potter said. "We never let off the gas. Sometimes it's easy when you get up 5-0, 6-0 to get bad habits where everyone wants a shot on frame, everyone wants a goal.
"But our girls stayed in position, passed the ball around. Everything we asked them to do, they put into practice. At halftime we challenged them to stay focused. I'm really happy they did that."
Despite it’s effort, North Shore Country Day couldn’t slow down its visitors.
"It's hard to get momentum in soccer," Kauffman said. "But when you do, you build off momentum with getting passes together, time and space. And when they can attack so quickly with so many offensive options, it does make it hard for us to get in a routine, while also trying to break up their flow of play."
University added a goal by junior forward Jenna Kilkus before the half for a 5-0 lead.
North Shore Country Day had some things to talk about during the break. Kauffman said the halftime message was pretty simple.
"One thing we talked about was getting rid of (University’s) time and space," she said. "They're very creative, very fast and aggressive, so we wanted to take away space from them.
"The other thing was to build on passes. Can we connect two passes to three and build it up to four and five?"
After knocking some of the rust off in the first half, the Raiders (0-2-0, 0-1-0) started to get some traction and advanced farther downfield on offense.
Unfortunately for the home squad, their efforts didn't equal a goal. The North Shore Country Day coaching took what it could from the match on a windy afternoon.
"I love that they're always together," Kauffman said. "No matter whether they're on the field, in class, eating lunch together, they love being together and there's not much that can take that away from them."
While its offense was putting the clamps on the North Shore Country Day offense, University stayed on the attack and looking for more goals.
The Maroons, who came into the game with 17 goals in seven games, got four more tallies in the second half. Stella Sturgill, who assisted on Kilkus' first half goal, scored her first goal of the year when she put one into the net in the 48th minute.
Senior forward Emilee Pak knocked in a goal in the 57th minute. Kilkus added a second three minutes later, this time from Elsa Nielsen. Lucy Aronsohn rounded out the scoring in the 68th minutes.
University knows that if its wants to be successful later in the season, the early portion of the schedule has to be loaded with bigger schools that will show them what they need to do to improve. That's why the coaching staff scheduled games against the likes of Young, St. Laurence, Mother McAuley and Fenwick. The Maroons went 2-1-1 against that group.
"Any time a coach calls us and says they want to play us, absolutely, we always say yes," Potter said. "As a smaller school, we know when we get to the playoffs, we're not going to face those bigger schools, so we want to learn those lessons.
"So, we build our schedule to be really tough, really gritty, to see what our team is made of. We're champing at the bit because we want to learn what it takes to be a Class AA, 3A school. We break down the film with the girls and see they're being a little more physical, a little quicker, so now, what can we do?"
After such a long time off, North Shore Country Day prepares for a tight schedule in just a short period of time. For the next two weeks, the Raiders will play a minimum of three games a week to make up for lost time.
"With every team in the spring, we're all in similar boats, but ours is a little different with our extended spring break," Kauffman said. "We need to come to practice with a plan, be focused on just that and not worrying about anything down the road.
"We want to get better practice and over time, it'll take us where we want to go."
Starting lineups
University (Chicago)
GK: Sarah Solomon
D: Haley Sturgill
D: Charlotte Sims
MF: Stella Sturgill
MF: Elsa Nielsen
MF: Lucy Aronsohn
MF: Carly Penn
MF: Meena Lee
MF: Orly Eggener
F: Emilee Pak
F: Jackie Slimmon
North Shore Country Day
GK: Peyton Hudson
D: Hannah Gallin
D: Lauren Iorio
D: Lexi Jackson
D: Alma Fitzgerald
MF: Ellie Stevenson
MF: Lilly Gallin
MF: Anna Ristic
MF: Charlotte Bartell
MF: Taylor Vallas
F: Lila Golson
Chicagoland Soccer MVP of the Match: Jenna Kilkus, jr., F, University (Chicago)
Scoring summary
First half
U: Carly Penn, 4th minute
U: Lucy Aronsohn, 11th minute
U: Charlotte Sims, 12th minute
U: Penn, 22nd minute
U: Jenna Kilkus (Stella Sturgill), 30th minute
Second half
U: Sturgill, 48th minute
U: Emilee Pak, 57th minute
U: Kilkus (Elsa Nielsen), 60th minute
U: Aronsohn, 68th minute
for battled-tested University
Host Raiders fall in 1st game since opening day
By Michael Wojtychiw
WINNETKA -- This spring season has thrown everyone's schedules off. With the weather going from beautiful to frigid, windy to downpour rain to snow it’s been difficult to get games in. Spring breaks and holidays add to the problem. Teams have struggled at times to play.
And then there’s North Shore Country Day.
After playing on the first day of the season, March 14, the Raiders did not play again until Thursday, 31 days later. The long unexpected break in matches came due to an extended spring break, two cancellations, a rescheduled league match and a league opponent cancelling its season.
So, it was really a second season-opener when North Shore Country Day hosted University (Chicago) in the Raiders’ Independent School League opener Thursday on the school's campus field.
Unfortunately for the hosts, University’s strong play and the long layoff were too much in a 9-0 loss.
"A game after any long stretch of time is tough and playing a team as strong as U-High makes it even more challenging," said North Shore Country Day assistant coach Rebekah Kauffman, who filled in for manager Lizzy Giffen. "For us, we knew it was going to be a tough game. We did our best with what we had and we competed. That's all we can ask for.
"Moving forward we have a number of areas we have to work on, and we'll do that. On to the next game."
University (5-2-1, 2-0-0) got off to a quick start, scoring in the fourth, 11th and 12th minutes on goals from Carly Penn, Charlotte Sims and Lucy Aronsohn.
The visitors' relentless attack continued to pour on the goals in the 18th minute, when a corner by Penn bounced off of North Shore Country Day keeper Peyton Hudson into the goal.
"What we talked about with the girls is the full effort they had," University manager Joshua Potter said. "We never let off the gas. Sometimes it's easy when you get up 5-0, 6-0 to get bad habits where everyone wants a shot on frame, everyone wants a goal.
"But our girls stayed in position, passed the ball around. Everything we asked them to do, they put into practice. At halftime we challenged them to stay focused. I'm really happy they did that."
Despite it’s effort, North Shore Country Day couldn’t slow down its visitors.
"It's hard to get momentum in soccer," Kauffman said. "But when you do, you build off momentum with getting passes together, time and space. And when they can attack so quickly with so many offensive options, it does make it hard for us to get in a routine, while also trying to break up their flow of play."
University added a goal by junior forward Jenna Kilkus before the half for a 5-0 lead.
North Shore Country Day had some things to talk about during the break. Kauffman said the halftime message was pretty simple.
"One thing we talked about was getting rid of (University’s) time and space," she said. "They're very creative, very fast and aggressive, so we wanted to take away space from them.
"The other thing was to build on passes. Can we connect two passes to three and build it up to four and five?"
After knocking some of the rust off in the first half, the Raiders (0-2-0, 0-1-0) started to get some traction and advanced farther downfield on offense.
Unfortunately for the home squad, their efforts didn't equal a goal. The North Shore Country Day coaching took what it could from the match on a windy afternoon.
"I love that they're always together," Kauffman said. "No matter whether they're on the field, in class, eating lunch together, they love being together and there's not much that can take that away from them."
While its offense was putting the clamps on the North Shore Country Day offense, University stayed on the attack and looking for more goals.
The Maroons, who came into the game with 17 goals in seven games, got four more tallies in the second half. Stella Sturgill, who assisted on Kilkus' first half goal, scored her first goal of the year when she put one into the net in the 48th minute.
Senior forward Emilee Pak knocked in a goal in the 57th minute. Kilkus added a second three minutes later, this time from Elsa Nielsen. Lucy Aronsohn rounded out the scoring in the 68th minutes.
University knows that if its wants to be successful later in the season, the early portion of the schedule has to be loaded with bigger schools that will show them what they need to do to improve. That's why the coaching staff scheduled games against the likes of Young, St. Laurence, Mother McAuley and Fenwick. The Maroons went 2-1-1 against that group.
"Any time a coach calls us and says they want to play us, absolutely, we always say yes," Potter said. "As a smaller school, we know when we get to the playoffs, we're not going to face those bigger schools, so we want to learn those lessons.
"So, we build our schedule to be really tough, really gritty, to see what our team is made of. We're champing at the bit because we want to learn what it takes to be a Class AA, 3A school. We break down the film with the girls and see they're being a little more physical, a little quicker, so now, what can we do?"
After such a long time off, North Shore Country Day prepares for a tight schedule in just a short period of time. For the next two weeks, the Raiders will play a minimum of three games a week to make up for lost time.
"With every team in the spring, we're all in similar boats, but ours is a little different with our extended spring break," Kauffman said. "We need to come to practice with a plan, be focused on just that and not worrying about anything down the road.
"We want to get better practice and over time, it'll take us where we want to go."
Starting lineups
University (Chicago)
GK: Sarah Solomon
D: Haley Sturgill
D: Charlotte Sims
MF: Stella Sturgill
MF: Elsa Nielsen
MF: Lucy Aronsohn
MF: Carly Penn
MF: Meena Lee
MF: Orly Eggener
F: Emilee Pak
F: Jackie Slimmon
North Shore Country Day
GK: Peyton Hudson
D: Hannah Gallin
D: Lauren Iorio
D: Lexi Jackson
D: Alma Fitzgerald
MF: Ellie Stevenson
MF: Lilly Gallin
MF: Anna Ristic
MF: Charlotte Bartell
MF: Taylor Vallas
F: Lila Golson
Chicagoland Soccer MVP of the Match: Jenna Kilkus, jr., F, University (Chicago)
Scoring summary
First half
U: Carly Penn, 4th minute
U: Lucy Aronsohn, 11th minute
U: Charlotte Sims, 12th minute
U: Penn, 22nd minute
U: Jenna Kilkus (Stella Sturgill), 30th minute
Second half
U: Sturgill, 48th minute
U: Emilee Pak, 57th minute
U: Kilkus (Elsa Nielsen), 60th minute
U: Aronsohn, 68th minute