Regional’s top seed advances

Huntley's Rachel Chapius (left) and Jamie Wimberly embrace Saturday as they celebrate while Cary-Grove's Allie Simon puts her head to the ground during the IHSA Class 3A Crystal Lake South Regional championship. Huntley beat Cary-Grove, 2-1, and will play Rockford Boylan on Tuesday at Jacobs High School. (Lauren M. Anderson - landerson@nwherald.com)

E-mail this story

Print this story

Share

CRYSTAL LAKE – Huntley coach Kris Grabner thinks that his Red Raiders should have met Cary-Grove later in the girls soccer playoffs instead of Saturday’s IHSA Crystal Lake South Class 3A Regional championship.

Top-seeded Huntley beat the second-seeded Trojans, 2-1, in a physical battle that more resembled a Blackhawks Stanley Cup playoff game than a soccer match.

SDLqIt is an absolute crime that this was a regional final game,” Grabner said. “Cary-Grove doesn’t deserve to go home after that game, and if the state had done proper seeding, we meet in the sectional. They are easily one of the top four teams in the section.”

Huntley (23-1-1) advances to play Boylan in the Jacobs Sectional semifinals at 6 p.m. Tuesday.

Sophomore Aimee Wronski tipped in the first goal for the Red Raiders 16 minutes into the first half off a pass from her sister, Corinne, to give Huntley the early lead.

C-G (18-3) responded with Kelli Anderson’s goal, but the tie didn’t last long, as Huntley senior Kristina Barreto scored what proved to be the game-winner two minutes later off a centering pass from sophomore Emily Konior.

“I wasn’t ready to be done yet,” Barreto said. “[Konior] gave me a great pass, and I was just right there to finish. [C-G] is a great team, but we’re all ready to go so much farther.”

Huntley played more defensively to start the second half, as C-G turned up the pressure on Huntley goalkeeper Sara Hoffman, who made some point-blank saves to keep the Red Raiders ahead.

“We didn’t make any major adjustments, and we played our game,” C-G coach Raymond Krystal said. “Our style of play stayed fairly consistent to what we’ve done all season, and it’s just a matter of not capitalizing on the chances we had today.”

Officials handed out five yellow cards, including one to Krystal, who argued a yellow card issued to Taylor Mahoney. Alyssa Silvestri, Samantha Zobott and Kaylee O’Brien received yellow cards for Huntley.

“It was brutal out there, and we kept getting hit hard,” Aimee Wronski said. “There were a lot of yellow cards, but we played through it, and I actually thought it was a pretty clean game.”