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A team to remember bows out with class By Eddie Burns
Neuqua had its quest derailed by Lyons Township with a 1-0 defeat in the Class 3A Super-Sectional contest played at Benedictine University on Tuesday night. The fact the Wildcats were unable to win their second state championship in school history can’t drown out the amount of success Neuqua had this past season. The Wildcats, who finished 28-1 per the IHSA, managed to jump to No. 2 in the National Soccer Coaches Association of America Poll, they won the Pepsi Showdown in their first appearance, Neuqua went undefeated through the Upstate Eight Conference and they put together a 28-match unbeaten streak. “Does one game define your season? No. I am proud of these guys,” Kees said. “The way it can be a perfect season is if the players can handle losing with class and dignity because God knows they know how to win, but it is important in life to know how to lose to. When you look around they did that. They held themselves well and with class and dignity. For me, that is a perfect season.” Neuqua was attempting to beat Lyons (24-3) for a third time. Two of the Lions’ three losses occurred against the Wildcats. “We knew it was going to be a challenge, but we were up for it,” forward Scott Davis said. However, a suffocating defense and solid goalie play helped Lyons pull off the upset. The Wildcats sat and watched as the Lions danced and celebrated on the field moments after the game. After about 10 minutes, Kees gathered Neuqua for one last time in a circle and it was where the team remained for close to 35 minutes. “It was a great season,” defender Keegan Balle said. “We had one loss over 29 games and you can’t argue with that. We just had a great inner circle talk where all of the guys came together one last time – it is just rough we had to break it off now, but it was a great season.” When the Wildcats emerged from their final huddle, they received cheers from fans and supports that had waited to show the team their appreciation. Kees said he was amazed throughout the season at how many people were impacted by watching the Wildcats. “Here is the other thing people said to me how much fun they had coming to a Neuqua game,” Kees said. “Some people said they learned something about soccer ever time they watched us play. Other people came to watch us because nobody plays like us and we were fun to watch. Those are things that are a legacy. This was a very special team to work with day in and day out on and off the field. They were a classy talent and it was almost a perfect team and we fell a little bit short in the end.” Lyons’ lone tally came in the 60th minute off a restart deep in Neuqua territory. The Wildcats had issues with defending restarts on and off throughout the season. It marked the first time all season that Neuqua had trailed that late into a match. Outside of a match against Addison Trail, Neuqua had not trailed this season. “We wanted to stay composed because there was 20 minutes left, but as the game started dwindling down the game started to get more urgent and maybe we panicked a couple of times,” Balle said. “As those final seconds ticked away it was heartbreaking.” Kees felt his team played well enough to win. “It is not that Lyons came in and ran over us,” Kees said. “I thought we were the better team in terms of moving the ball and doing what you would try to do to get goals, but our sport is cruel sometimes and it doesn’t always reward the better team and Lyons is good enough where I’m not going to say they didn’t deserve to win because they did because they made a play and we didn’t. End of story. I told the boys they played really good, but they didn’t make enough plays. Bottom line – end of story.” Davis, who finished with 24 goals said this past season was the best soccer experience of his life. “This is absolutely not what we wanted,” said Davis about the loss to Lyons. “But this was absolutely by far the best soccer team I’ve been a part of throughout my career. I’m going to have lifetime friendships because of this. I know this isn’t the way we wanted this to end, but in our eyes it was a very successful season – just one game didn’t go our way. I’m just really proud of all of our boys. It is a shame we couldn’t get it done, but tip your have to Lyons, move on and live with it.”
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Neuqua Valley's 2009 results
Postseason play
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From the minute Tony Kees accepted the Neuqua Valley coaching position in late spring the only mission for the 2009 Wildcats was bringing home a state championship.