Spartans' fine season ends at supersectional

 

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By Matt Le Cren

When Wheaton Academy and St. Francis meet on the soccer field, both teams bring their best effort.

The two private schools are located just five miles apart, but you can’t really call it a rivalry because Wheaton Academy has never lost to St. Francis.

The Spartans are closing the gap, but as the saying goes, close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades. So Wheaton Academy’s dominance continues after the Warriors blanked the Spartans 2-0 Tuesday at the Class 2A Benedictine University Supersectional.

Wheaton Academy (15-6) is in the state semifinals for the third straight year and will take on Troy Triad at 1 p.m. Friday at Naperville Central. St. Francis ends its most successful playoff run with an 18-7-2 record, having been sent home for the third consecutive year by the Warriors.

Unlike the past two years, when the Warriors knocked off the Spartans 4-1 and 4-0 in the sectional final, this match was close. In fact, St. Francis arguably was the better team in the first half and for some of the second half.

“The second half we were kind of down (at the start),” Wheaton Academy forward Ally Witt said. “I think we refocused and got the first-half jitters out.

“We were so psyched. There’s so much animosity between the schools. It was a lot of hype and so we had to calm down and play our game. Who cares who we were playing?”

For Witt, that meant being her usual tenacious self in the attacking third. With St. Francis doing a good job of shutting down Crystal Thomas, who had scored eight goals in her previous two playoff matches, it was up to Witt to break through and she did, scoring twice to increase her team-leading goal total to 29.

The first goal came with 13:29 left in the second half and was the most painful goal Witt has bagged. The junior chased a long ball from Thomas and touched the ball just before colliding violently with Spartans goalie Jenna Ditusa just inside the penalty area.

Both players went down, with Witt landing hard on her hip. As she watched from the ground, the ball rolled into the goal before two St. Francis defenders could get to it.

“I looked up and saw it rolling in and I saw people running toward it, so I got scared,” said Witt, who was unable to get up for nearly five minutes. “I was like, ‘No, no, go faster.’ But I knew if I got a touch on it it would chip over it.”

The play resulted in the strange sight of Witt waving her arms in celebration as she writhed in pain.

“I was in so much pain” said Witt, who stayed down for nearly five minutes before limping off. “I was like, ‘Oh, my gosh, this hurts but this is awesome. I always laugh off pain.”

Wheaton Academy coach Scott Marksberry, said that is typical of Witt.

“Ally is just a fighter up there,” Marksberry said. “She’s scrappy, she’s fast, she’s strong. She’s tough to defend and that’s just what that goal was all about. The keeper made a good play on it and Ally just got the touch and the spin just carried it into the goal.”

Marksberry said he noticed a difference in Witt after she received a yellow card for deceiving the opponent with 21:28 remaining in the second half.

“At that point of the game St. Francis had the better of the possession,” Marksberry said. “They had been coming at us and we were waiting for something to change the game and I think what did was Ally getting a yellow card. She doesn’t get many of those and at it kind of made her mad. She came out with a little bit of fire.”

The Spartans thought the goal should not have counted.

“The first goal they all thought it was offsides and the linesman didn’t call it,” St. Francis coach Jim Winslow said. “I had to clarify that with the kids but that’s what they thought was going on, so they pulled up.

“And then the last 10 minutes is just survival, because they’re dead and we’re dead and we’re starting to throw numbers up and you’re hoping you’re getting an opportunity to tie it.”

Instead, it was Witt who got another opportunity and finished. Though still feeling the effects of her hip pointer, Witt was ready when the Warriors counterattacked and a pass from Kerrin Clancy found her just outside the box. She quickly dribbled into the box between two defenders and blasted an eight-yard shot under the crossbar with 5:17 remaining.

“I thought we definitely had a lot of the possession but Wheaton Academy is a great team and just like in club, if you make a mistake, Wheaton Academy is the type of team that will punish you for that mistake,” St. Francis striker Andi Matichak said. “Our first one was a misclear…and Ally basically had a tap-in. And then the second one was a misstep and Ally just walked in.”

The Spartans, who were making their supersectional debut, didn’t make any mistakes in the first half and held a slight edge in play, outshooting the Warriors 5-4. They would have taken the lead if not for Wheaton Academy goalie Kristen Morency, who deflected a 40-yard free kick from Taylor Bucaro into the crossbar with 11:15 to go before intermission.

“My mentality on that one was, ‘This is not going in,’” Morency said. “I tried to get whatever I could on that and it happened to hit the crossbar.”

“We had better opportunities,” St. Francis coach Jim Winslow said. “We did a better job in the first 20-25 minutes of playing in front of them and then we didn’t play enough width. The first half we got in behind them and we got in behind them wide, and we didn’t take advantage of that in the second half. We did it once or twice but not enough.”

Wheaton Academy’s back line led by Clancy, Brigitta Engebretsen and Sarah Janus played a role in that. They completely shut down Matichak, who scored the only goal in the Spartans’ 1-0 victory over Nazareth on Friday that gave St. Francis the first sectional championship in school history.

Matichak was held without a shot on goal. Her only attempt came with 9:00 left in the second half when she got the ball on the right side of the box and knocked it wide after being challenged by Morency.

“I felt bad for Andi because she was getting everything but drug down,” Winslow said. “She wasn’t getting a break, but it is what it is, so you’ve got to deal with it.”

Despite the loss, the future is bright for the Spartans, who graduate only four players – starters Taylor Ravlin and Dana Dubois and reserves Shannon Zierk and Hallie Woods.

“We left everything out on the field,” Matichak said. “No regrets.”