Lancers put up good fight in loss to WW South

By Curt Herron

A lot of coaches would be very disappointed if their squad fell behind after giving up two goals during the final 10 minutes of a match.

But that's not the way that veteran Lake Park Norm Hillner preferred to look at things after his squad fell 4-2 to Wheaton Warrenville South on Saturday.

After all, his Lancers had just given the once-beaten Tigers all that they could handle during the first 70 minutes of the nonconference clash in Roselle.

So although Lake Park came up on the short end of the scoreboard against highly-regard South, Hillner was pleased with his team's effort throughout.

That was especially so considering the 8-8-2 Lancers were missing a few regulars and lost co-captain Mike Keane to injury with about 20 minutes left.

"With 10 minutes to go, it's a 2-2 game against a very strong team and we're attacking," Hillner said. "We've had some struggles but we're working on some things as a team.

"We had a lot of chances and it was just a matter of finishing some of them off. Sometimes we should have shot and we didn't shoot. But this was a positive experience for us.

"They had three of four guys with incredible speed and if you want to move along in the state tournament that's the type of team that you have to beat and we stayed with them."

Things started out well for Lake Park after it took the lead just 9:11 into the match when Elson Divinagracia scored into an empty net.

The Lancers had several other good chances midway through the half as Sal Cali and Tyler Sadowski sent in shots which were deflected away.

But the Tigers were able to even things up with with 6:25 left before the break on a goal by Joe Bianucci.

South grabbed a 2-1 advantage with 31:57 remaining in the match when Ricky Munguia connected.

Lake Park challenged with good shot tries from Lou Cesario, Cali and Divinagracia, but a pair of those shots were cleared by defenders.

The hosts were able to force a tie at 2-2 with 22:51 to go after Kevin Twarog found the net, following a pass from Keane.

After Lancer keeper Eric Ahrens came up with a pair of saves right after the score, the hosts suffered a setback when Keane got injured.

Despite the significant loss, Lake Park still got off threatening shot attempts from Twarog, Alec Kubica and Divinigracia.

South's Alden Marton picked up the game-winner with 9:36 remaining when he headed in a shot following an assist from Alec Brazeau.

Then just 94 seconds later, the Tigers found the net again as George Doran made a diving header off of a pass from Brazeau.

After opening the week with a 4-1 win over Larkin, the Lancers dropped a 3-1 nonconference match at Lake Forest Academy on Thursday.

Lake Park has three Upstate Eight matches this week, playing at St. Charles North on Monday and at South Elgin Thursday before hosting Elgin on Saturday.

Lancers starters vs. Tigers

Lancers Schedule