Benet falls to Naperville North in sectional semifinal

NAPERVILLE – Neuqua Valley was the only team to beat Naperville Central during the regular season.

The Wildcats repeated the feat Tuesday, knocking the top-ranked Redhawks out of the postseason with a 1-0 victory in the Class 3A Naperville North sectional semifinal.

No. 6 Neuqua Valley (16-3) also won 2-1 against Naperville Central (20-2-1) on April 8.

“There was a lot more at stake tonight,” Wildcats coach Arnoldo Gonzalez said. “We have to come in and play pretty much a perfect game. We know most perfect games don’t exist, but we were going to have to play close to it either way. If we made a mistake we were going to pay for it.”

Freshman Caitlin King won a ball and sent it about 40 yards ahead to junior Alexis May to get the game-winning play started.

“I knew I had to keep fighting and just knew I could get to that ball and Alexis (May) was running down and could finish it,” King said. “I played it to her and had full faith in her that she could finish it.”

May dribbled into the box before firing it successfully with 37:33 to play.

“I had more time than I thought,” May said. “I saw Caitlin and had to beat two players so I had to get it in. She played a beautiful ball right to my feet and I thought maybe I could take a shot with my right foot, and I cut it to my left and just placed it (in the) bottom right corner.”

Senior Callie Tumilty was able to create some chances to keep Naperville Central’s hopes alive for an equalizer, but it never came. Junior Malia Shen’s 18-yard liner into Neuqua Valley senior goalkeeper Elizabeth Friend’s grips was the Redhawks’ last scoring opportunity in the 77th minute.

“We just kept our focus on our game plan,” May said. “We’ve been working really hard in practice and it’s been showing on the field because we beat them again after we shared (the) conference (title) with them.”

They’ll share the stage with No. 8 Naperville North (14-5-3) on Friday night for the regional title. The Huskies beat No. 15 Benet, 3-0, in the night’s earlier semifinal.

Senior Abby Penn could hear coach Steve Goletz ask her about stepping up against the Redwings, but at the moment she had a corner kick to take.

“Goletz has high expectations for us so it was probably about a mistake or something,” she explained. “I knew I had to step up this year in taking corner kicks. Just getting that first goal really set the tone for the game. But I knew what I had to do on that play and (sophomore) Kennedy (Bertsch) got on the other end of it.”

Bertsch used her head to finish it in the 16th minute.

The Huskies tacked on a couple more goals in the second half. Meanwhile, Benet (14-7-2) couldn’t generate any offense.

“With their defense we couldn’t get anything going,” Benet coach Gerard Oconer said. “You have to be fully on your game to win any game in this sectional. I told the girls in a lot of ways winning a regional and sectional like this is like going to state in 2A.”

Meanwhile, the Huskies were dangerous throughout, especially when sophomore Lauren Pera drew a fall with 32:27 remaining. Junior Claire DeCook blasted in the PK over and just to the right of Benet goalkeeper Giada McGlynn for a 2-0 lead.

“With the PKs I’m walking up with confidence and have already envisioned making them,” DeCook said. “This is by far the most (PKs) I’ve taken. There have been so many this year.”

Pera found a way to make it 3-0 with 7:44 left, curling in a shot just inside the near post.