Notebook: Warren, Lake Forest
By Patrick Z. McGavin
On May 13, Emily Soriaga worked the right edge and drove a corner kick into the box at Lake Forest.
A couple of minutes later, she juked out a Scouts’ defender and took a shot off the dribble. She was free and relaxed and living in the moment.
From the time she first arrived at Warren, Soriaga has set herself apart with the precision and power of her shot.
Time has whisked by. She came in part of a strong group of freshmen that included midfielders Amber Langosch and Melissa Cote.
The Trinity International recruit is now bracing for the end of her run. The lost junior year due to the pandemic season certainly accelerated her timeline.
Now Soriaga, Langosch and Cote are stalwarts, the last of their respective class.
“It’s definitely a different experience,” Soriaga said. “I feel like all of my time on varsity, I always felt I was looking up to the seniors. Now I’m the role model for all the underclassmen.”
After a strong two-day performance in the no. 8 Blue Devils’ back-to-back wins over Lake Forest and Carmel, Warren is playing its best soccer of the year.
The team is organized, dangerous and hard to slow down. Leading up to the game, Lake Forest had only permitted one multiple-goal game, a 2-1 loss against Carmel.
Warren scored three goals in the first half.
“The girls I was with in the past played a really good game, but we also brought in some new girls from club (soccer) who are also really good,” Soriaga said. “I feel like my role has stayed the same.”
The subtext of this season is the quotation of Shakespeare’s Sonnet 30: “I summon up remembrance of things past.”
The seniors have dedicated the year to the group that lost out on the chance to have the same experience.
“I was really close with a lot of the seniors, so not being able to play with them was really unfortunate,” Soriaga said. “Now we have a new group of girls and we’re close as well. New opportunities to make new friends.”
Warren coach Ryan McCabe has also gone out of his way to pay tribute to those players.
“It was tough,” McCabe said. “Just talking with some of the seniors who’ve gone on to play college or gone on to college, they talk about how much they miss it.
“That was one of the toughest parts for those girls who had been with the program for four years to miss out on their senior year. We play these games with them in mind, and that keeps our motivation and focus because we are not taking any games for granted.”
The seniors have experienced a whole range. The 2017 team is probably the best in program history, the North Suburban Conference champion who lost to eventual state champion Barrington in a Class 3A sectional final.
This year’s group has a similar potential with its influx of club players intertwined with the experienced players like Soriaga, Langosch and junior forward Ella Skelton.
Stevenson’s 1-0 upset of previously unbeaten Libertyville has opened a pathway for the Blue Devils to claim their share of the conference lead. Warren travels to Stevenson on May 25.
“We have to run the gauntlet, and we are going to run into a lot of really good teams over these next couple of weeks,” McCabe said.
“It’s something we’ve gotten used to.”
Lake Forest knows all about the gauntlet. The Warren game kicked off a murder’s row of three-straight top-level opponents: no. 8 Warren; no. 4 New Trier; and they will face no. 16 Stevenson on Tuesday (May 18).
Lake Forest is a very good team.
“They have a lot of really fast girls up-front, and they really put some pressure against us,” McCabe said.
Like the Blue Devils, Lake Forest is caught in between spaces, wanting to celebrate the next frontier as they simultaneously acknowledge what was lost by not being able to play last year.
Lake Forest had a legitimate claim to missing out on the window of a state championship team. The Scouts were ready to welcome back six high Division I players who left the high school team after their freshmen season to focus on the developmental academy level.
Three of those players -- Ingrid Falls, Nicole Doucette and Bridget Mitchell -- are now at Northwestern.
“We were all so devastated,” senior defender Lindsey Asmussen said. “We were so excited to get those girls back from club soccer for their senior year. Honestly, my heart goes out to those girls. They were so excited to have their senior year.
“I think a lot of the seniors now are really playing for them. We all miss that year. We still think about that year to this day. We’re just playing like it’s our last game.”
That sense of urgency and immediacy animates the play of the Scouts—hungry, vital, eager to learn. Lake Forest played without three starters against Warren.
They returned Saturday and played New Trier to a very tight and highly competitive 1-0 loss.
Lake Forest takes nothing for granted, and never beats themselves. They force the other team to make plays. Warren did just that. It was never easy.
“The Warren game went against us,” Lake Forest coach Ty Stuckslager said. “We’re down 3-0, and we talked at halftime about how we can get better.
“They didn’t change their lineups, and yet we played much better.
“We have three starters not playing. We are deep enough, but we have to find our rhythm and understand what our roles are.”
By Patrick Z. McGavin
On May 13, Emily Soriaga worked the right edge and drove a corner kick into the box at Lake Forest.
A couple of minutes later, she juked out a Scouts’ defender and took a shot off the dribble. She was free and relaxed and living in the moment.
From the time she first arrived at Warren, Soriaga has set herself apart with the precision and power of her shot.
Time has whisked by. She came in part of a strong group of freshmen that included midfielders Amber Langosch and Melissa Cote.
The Trinity International recruit is now bracing for the end of her run. The lost junior year due to the pandemic season certainly accelerated her timeline.
Now Soriaga, Langosch and Cote are stalwarts, the last of their respective class.
“It’s definitely a different experience,” Soriaga said. “I feel like all of my time on varsity, I always felt I was looking up to the seniors. Now I’m the role model for all the underclassmen.”
After a strong two-day performance in the no. 8 Blue Devils’ back-to-back wins over Lake Forest and Carmel, Warren is playing its best soccer of the year.
The team is organized, dangerous and hard to slow down. Leading up to the game, Lake Forest had only permitted one multiple-goal game, a 2-1 loss against Carmel.
Warren scored three goals in the first half.
“The girls I was with in the past played a really good game, but we also brought in some new girls from club (soccer) who are also really good,” Soriaga said. “I feel like my role has stayed the same.”
The subtext of this season is the quotation of Shakespeare’s Sonnet 30: “I summon up remembrance of things past.”
The seniors have dedicated the year to the group that lost out on the chance to have the same experience.
“I was really close with a lot of the seniors, so not being able to play with them was really unfortunate,” Soriaga said. “Now we have a new group of girls and we’re close as well. New opportunities to make new friends.”
Warren coach Ryan McCabe has also gone out of his way to pay tribute to those players.
“It was tough,” McCabe said. “Just talking with some of the seniors who’ve gone on to play college or gone on to college, they talk about how much they miss it.
“That was one of the toughest parts for those girls who had been with the program for four years to miss out on their senior year. We play these games with them in mind, and that keeps our motivation and focus because we are not taking any games for granted.”
The seniors have experienced a whole range. The 2017 team is probably the best in program history, the North Suburban Conference champion who lost to eventual state champion Barrington in a Class 3A sectional final.
This year’s group has a similar potential with its influx of club players intertwined with the experienced players like Soriaga, Langosch and junior forward Ella Skelton.
Stevenson’s 1-0 upset of previously unbeaten Libertyville has opened a pathway for the Blue Devils to claim their share of the conference lead. Warren travels to Stevenson on May 25.
“We have to run the gauntlet, and we are going to run into a lot of really good teams over these next couple of weeks,” McCabe said.
“It’s something we’ve gotten used to.”
Lake Forest knows all about the gauntlet. The Warren game kicked off a murder’s row of three-straight top-level opponents: no. 8 Warren; no. 4 New Trier; and they will face no. 16 Stevenson on Tuesday (May 18).
Lake Forest is a very good team.
“They have a lot of really fast girls up-front, and they really put some pressure against us,” McCabe said.
Like the Blue Devils, Lake Forest is caught in between spaces, wanting to celebrate the next frontier as they simultaneously acknowledge what was lost by not being able to play last year.
Lake Forest had a legitimate claim to missing out on the window of a state championship team. The Scouts were ready to welcome back six high Division I players who left the high school team after their freshmen season to focus on the developmental academy level.
Three of those players -- Ingrid Falls, Nicole Doucette and Bridget Mitchell -- are now at Northwestern.
“We were all so devastated,” senior defender Lindsey Asmussen said. “We were so excited to get those girls back from club soccer for their senior year. Honestly, my heart goes out to those girls. They were so excited to have their senior year.
“I think a lot of the seniors now are really playing for them. We all miss that year. We still think about that year to this day. We’re just playing like it’s our last game.”
That sense of urgency and immediacy animates the play of the Scouts—hungry, vital, eager to learn. Lake Forest played without three starters against Warren.
They returned Saturday and played New Trier to a very tight and highly competitive 1-0 loss.
Lake Forest takes nothing for granted, and never beats themselves. They force the other team to make plays. Warren did just that. It was never easy.
“The Warren game went against us,” Lake Forest coach Ty Stuckslager said. “We’re down 3-0, and we talked at halftime about how we can get better.
“They didn’t change their lineups, and yet we played much better.
“We have three starters not playing. We are deep enough, but we have to find our rhythm and understand what our roles are.”