Royals hit with early onslaught

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ELMHURST -- Hinckley-Big Rock knew it would have to play a near-perfect game to beat Timothy Christian on the Trojans' home field in the boys soccer Class A Hinckley-Big Rock Sectional. The two teams met previously this season and Timothy walked away with an easy 5-1 victory.

Instead, the team that traveled 39 miles to play its most important game of the season faced a deficit a mere 32 seconds into the match. It didn't get much better from there, as the Royals season ended with a 5-0 loss Monday night.

"They were ready to play and we really weren't," said defender Brian Michaels. "They've got more talent and we knew we had to come out hard. We just didn't come out geared up enough I guess."

Michaels said the team's long bus ride had nothing to do with its slow start. The Trojans were clearly the aggressors in the first half, moving the ball down the field and crossing it with relative easy and almost no pressure from the Royals' defense.

Hinckley-Big Rock's offense, on the other hand, played kick-and-run and had trouble possessing the ball, leading to consistent one- or two-man advantages for Timothy Christian.

With the Royals already down 1-0, Timothy put Hinckley through its worst 7:06 of the season.

Joel Sytsma had a hat trick in that time, scoring all three goals off of headers from two corner kicks and one throw-in. Justin Groenewold added his second goal of the game on a wide-open shot thanks to a cross from Josh Pegman.

And with 19 minutes to play, the Royals were down by five goals and looked shell-shocked.

"Our defense is pretty vulnerable to having that happen," said goalie Patrick Sutherland. "Our offense needed some help."

But the offense got no help, and the Royals couldn't help themselves despite an overwhelming number of free kicks in the first half.

Hinckley could only manage two shots in the first half and played a mostly methodical style that was swallowed up by the quicker Timothy defense. The Royals also allowed eight corner kicks, leaving its goalie Sutherland under constant fire.

"I thought I was going to have to do more than (what I did)," Sutherland said.

But after the offensive onslaught, the Royals started to turn things around, and the game was played relatively even the rest of the way.

"In the second half we played excellent," said Sutherland, who added that he was disappointed his team wouldn't get to play the sectional on its home field.

Timothy subbed in some of its lesser-used players in the second half, and the teams traded momentum until the finish.

Hinckley ended its season with an 11-12 record.

"In the second half we played better," said coach Dan Wallenberg. "We were aggressive. We've got players capable of it. We just didn't play two halves."

jsahly@scn1.com