Loprieno leads Raiders

Cary-Grove's Jamie Simon (left) and Huntley's Aimee Wronski compete for possession during the first half on Thursday. Huntley won, 3-1. ( Lauren M. Anderson - landerson@nwherald.com)

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CARY – Delaney Loprieno got a perfect pass from Huntley teammate Sam Zobott just to the left of Cary-Grove’s net on Thursday, and it quickly became apparent why Huntley girls soccer coach Kris Grabner wanted to make sure Loprieno got her touches.

Loprieno broke open a scoreless match with a shot into the right corner, then netted the most important goal of the game 15 minutes later to negate C-G’s equalizer.

With everything the Red Raiders did correctly in their 3-1 Fox Valley Conference Valley Division victory against the Trojans, finding Loprieno proved to be the most important move against a C-G team that played stout defense and made few mistakes.

“We all wanted this one so bad,” Loprieno said. “The seniors always keep us motivated, no matter what, and we wanted to make sure we responded.”

Loprieno’s goal at the 34-minute mark in the second half gave Huntley the 1-0 advantage that C-G had made so difficult to achieve.

The Trojans (9-7-1 overall, 6-3 FVC Valley) had marked the Raiders (11-1-1, 6-0-0) man-to-man in the first half, and it had caused Huntley problems in the final third.

Loprieno’s goal was only the Raiders’ third shot on goal.

“I was impressed with what they did tonight,” Grabner said of C-G. “Especially [sophomore defender Jamie Simon], she is an outstanding defender. They made us work.”

C-G evened the score at 1 on junior forward Korey Kronforst’s goal with 20:04 left to play, but it took Loprieno only 26 seconds to answer.

She beat her defender on the left side of net and nudged in the goal for the 2-1 advantage with 19:38 left in the second half.

“She’s so dynamic,” Grabner said. “When she gets the ball late in the game, she can be dangerous.”

Senior forward Aimee Wronski added an insurance goal 6 minutes later, winning the ball at the right corner of the Trojans’ box and putting it past C-G keeper Krystal Felderman for what became the final margin.

“I think I just kind of caught [Felderman] off guard,” Wronski said. “I just went for it and I don’t think she was ready.”

The work rate and discipline C-G displayed trumped the outcome, Kronforst said. Thursday’s was the kind of showing the Trojans wanted against the Raiders, who are ranked No. 14 nationally by ESPN Rise.

“I think we did a great job tonight,” Kronforst said. “We knew they were a great team, and we knew we would have to come out ready to play. We got everything out of this match that we wanted to get.”

C-G coach Ray Krystal concurred.

“I couldn’t be more proud of the way they played,” he said.