CL South ousted too soon

Crystal Lake South’s Jacob Stock puts his head in his hands after the Gators’ 2-1 loss to Larkin in their IHSA Class 3A Barrington Sectional semifinal Tuesday. The Gators finished the season with a 19-4-2 record. (Lauren M. Anderson - landerson@nwherald.com)

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BARRINGTON – Entering its game against Larkin on Tuesday, Crystal Lake South’s boys soccer players knew the Royals were young and figured that made them dangerous.

The Royals proved to be lethal.

Larkin, a Cinderella in the Class 3A Barrington Sectional after upsetting its way through the Huntley Regional last week, put the favored Gators on guard early, slipped the go-ahead goal through with seven minutes remaining in the match and won Tuesday’s sectional semifinal, 2-1, to end one of South’s best seasons and all the hopes the Gators had dared to start thinking.

South players tried to find the words after the loss to describe the disappointment, but as Larkin players celebrated a win that seemed so improbable entering Tuesday’s match, there was little to say.

“We win as a team, and we lose as a team,” senior forward Jono Gutmann said. “But once they scored on us, it was like we just said, ‘Oh, [no].’ ”

Larkin (9-15-1) starts one senior, three juniors, three sophomores and four freshmen, so South felt it had the advantage in terms of experience.

But the Royals’ defense kept the Gators (19-4-2) in check for much of the match – enough that the match was scoreless at halftime, despite South taking six shots.

“We didn’t make any big adjustments,” South coach Brian Allen said. “I think we came out [of halftime] playing a little better, our work rate was definitely there, and we battled the whole way. But we didn’t ever get that killer instinct at any point.”

South sophomore forward Charlie Oliver opened the scoring five minutes into the second half with a shot from 15 yards out.

The Gators, though, got too complacent with their one-goal lead, Gutmann said.

“Our communication, our intensity, it all went down,” he said.

Larkin tied the match at 1 with 17:50 left. Sophomore defender Danny Ramirez lobbed a free kick to the left goal post, where Tony Hernandez received it and slipped it across to Erik Rodriguez, who buried it in South’s net.

Ten minutes later, the Royals nailed the door shut. Rodriguez took a shot from about 10 yards in front of South’s goal that zipped past Gators goalkeeper David Walsh.

Larkin had won only six matches during the regular season but has won three in the postseason. The Royals will look to continue their upstart status against vaunted Lake Zurich in the sectional final at 5 p.m. Friday at Barrington. The Bears beat Boylan, 3-0, in Tuesday’s other sectional final.

South is left to ponder what might have been, but also to celebrate all it accomplished. The Gators won the program’s first conference or division title in 12 years, taking the Fox Valley Conference Valley Division crown, and broke a five-year regional-title drought.

“We definitely raised the bar and put South where I had hoped we’d be able to,” Allen said. “It was one game, and we can’t let one game dictate the way we look at our season because we accomplished some great things.”

“We came into this season now expecting much other than to have fun,” Gutmann said. “But we started out well and we played together so well that we expected good things from our team.

“And we accomplished great things.”