Wildcats edge West Aurora for rematch with North

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Updated: December 6, 2010 11:13AM

WEST CHICAGO — As expected, Naperville North dispensed with Romeoville 2-0 in Tuesday’s opening semifinal of the West Chicago Class 3A Regional, so the only drama would be which DuPage Valley Conference foe would get a second shot at the DVC champs and Sun-Times No. 2-rated Huskies?

It took an extra 7:05 following a scoreless regulation before West Chicago avenged one of its conference losses with a 1-0 overtime victory over West Aurora. The Blackhawks, who finished the regular season going 4-0-1 in their last five contests, were hoping to get a chance to face the Huskies on a neutral field after losing a 1-0 overtime thriller at Naperville North.

But it’ll be the Wildcats (7-8-6) getting a second chance in Saturday’s 5 p.m. championship after losing a 3-1 regular-season meeting with the 17-2-2 Huskies.

While both teams had opportunities throughout regulation, there was 2:55 left in the opening 10-minute extra session when West Chicago’s Jayro Lopez set up Chris Quintana for the match-winner from the left side.

“Once I saw the goalkeeper coming out and being so near to me, I placed it to the other side of him with a simple touch, it didn’t need to be blasted,” Quintana said. “This regional is all about rematches for us and in tonight’s game we simply wanted it more.”

That goal avenged an earlier come-from-behind 4-3 overtime triumph for West Aurora in which the Blackhawks scored with 15 seconds left in regulation to force extra play. But this time West Chicago goalie Adrian Porcayo got to experience the opposite postmatch feeling.

“Getting revenge in the regional makes it that much better,” Porcayo said. “I wasn’t worried even though it was 0-0 throughout. I had it in my mind that I was going to keep them from scoring.”

Understandably it’s that’s much more disappointing for the Blackhawks whose season ends with a 16-6-1 record.

“They wanted it a lot more than we did,” senior Mike Vazquez said. “We just couldn’t get the ball in the back of the net. It’s a shame because with a freshman goalkeeper, he came up big for us so many times. I just wish we could’ve helped him by scoring a few goals.”

Having just been elevated to the varsity, freshman Alex Guillen made an impressive debut in goal for the Blackhawks with 11 saves. But West Chicago had a 12-8 edge in shots on goal and a 20-12 advantage for overall attempts.

“This is still the second best win total in 32 years at West,” Blackhawks coach Joe Sustersic said. “Our effort was great, unfortunately some of the guys weren’t as prepared to raise their level of play as much as we would have liked. West Chicago took it up another gear and that’s why they’ll get another shot at North.

“After last year’s school record 18 wins, we had to replace eight field players, so getting 16 wins indicates these guys overachieved. I’m not saying they didn’t deserve to win those matches, but they won a lot that we were expected to lose,” Sustersic said.

In the opener, Naperville North got off to a great start as Kyle Lindberg’s cross found Austin Maggard in perfect position to finish over the out-rushing Romeoville (11-11-0) keeper for a 1-0 lead just 2:01 into the contest.

“I saw Austin making a good outside run and just got him the ball, it was a real goof finish,” Lindberg said just before Maggard immediately added. “It was a great pass.”

The Huskies made it 2-0 after 10:27 when Evan Trychta finished off a scramble out front, but that proved to be a mixed blessing according to head coach Jim Konrad.

“Getting the two early goals was great from a standpoint of taking some pressure off, but I’m not sure it helped us too much because we played one of the poorest first halves I can remember,” Konrad said. “The second half was better in terms of creating some opportunities, although I would have preferred to see us finish more of them. Bottom line, I’m proud we won.”

Naperville North is gunning for a seventh consecutive regional crown with the last two being at the 3A level and the previous four in 2A dating back to 2002 when the Huskies finished fourth at state.