It’s still a little too early to say it’s been an up-and-down year for the Joliet West boys soccer team.

After all, Tuesday was just the team’s sixth contest of the season.

But as much as the first three weeks of the year can be up and down, that’s what it’s been for the Tigers. Thankfully for them, they were up on Tuesday.

Joliet West score four goals in the first 27 minutes of play at their home stadium to dismantle Plainfield North 6-2. That in moved them to 3-2-1 on the year.

It was a nice change of pace for Joliet West given the pattern it began the year with. The Tigers won their first two contests against Mt. Carmel and Lincoln-Way Central, dropped their second two against Kankakee and Joliet Central, and battled Lincoln-Way West to a draw on Saturday. Lincoln-Way Central and Joliet Central both went to PKs.

So, Tuesday was refreshing for coach Alan Stewart as the result wasn’t really in question after the Tigers took a 4-0 lead.

“We’ve really struggled putting the ball in the back of the net (this season),” Stewart said. “We were talking before the game today saying we can’t keep on wasting our opportunities. We’ve put up a ton of shots and out possessed every team we’ve played, but we lacked that urgency in the final third. ... I’m very proud of the guys today putting the goals in the back of the net.”

The first goal didn’t take too long as Santiago Sanchez managed to squeeze by the Plainfield North defense to sneak one in after eight minutes of play. Four minutes after that, Sanchez made it a brace for himself and gave Joliet West a 2-0 lead, sometimes referred to as “the worst lead.”

It certainly wasn’t the worst lead for West as Ivan Mendoza pushed the ball into the back of the net with 16 minutes remaining in the opening half to push the advantage to three. Three minutes later, Xavier Garcia collected a rebound and knocked it in to give the Tigers their fourth goal in 27 minutes.

Of course, give Plainfield North credit. Not 40 seconds after Joliet West earned its fourth goal, the other Tigers finally got on the board as Dylan Dwyer put the ball in off his left foot. The trimmed the deficit to three, but the score was still 4-1 at the midway point.

Twenty-five minutes remained when Joliet West’s number 25 increased the lead back to four. Emmanuel Tapia Fraire made it look easy as he celebrated on his way back to midfield.

He didn’t celebrate for long, though, as Joel Maritnez needed just 52 seconds to give Plainfield North their second goal of the evening. That trimmed things to 5-2.

Ronaldo Aguirre scored his first career varsity goal in the final four minutes to give the game its final score.

Plainfield North (2-4-1) has been having an up-and-down year themselves and had been hoping to move to .500 again. Instead, the goal differential on the season now sits at 11-20. North will look to get back on track against Bolingbrook on Thursday.

“We’ve got to brush it off, come train tomorrow and start figuring things out,” coach Lukasz Majewski said. “It can’t get much worse than this at this point. We’re a little beat up coming out of a couple tough games in a tournament, but we know we’re capable of a better effort than what we showed today.”

Joliet West will continue its season Thursday against Plainfield East. Garcia said the key to victory will be consistent energy.

“We’re going to come out with the same energy we came in with the first twenty minutes,” he said. “We came out attacking and scored a few goals in the first half. We’ll talk about it and try to keep that energy not just in the first half but in the second half against Plainfield East.”