Stay Connected with YourSeason
Luke Comerouski’s hat trick powers Christian Liberty
Updated: October 15, 2011 9:10PM
Luke Comerouski and Christian Liberty kept rolling on Saturday, knocking off St. Edward 3-0 in the Class 1A Westminster Christian Regional final.
On Comerouski’s first score, he connected on a beautiful header from the opposite side of the goal mouth off a corner kick by David Colbert with 24:35 left in the first half.
Only 34 seconds later, he took a shot that deflected off a St. Edward leg and went away from Green Wave goalie Matt Hesch into the opposite corner of the net for a 2-0 lead.
“He’s a finisher,” Christian Liberty coach Jed Bennett said of Comerouski. “He’s a great ball handler. But what he has is guys around him in the midfield who are also great ball handlers.
“It’s a great joint effort that he is the end result of.”
Comerouski’s third goal was a thing of beauty and involved little team play, as he dribbled and beat a couple defenders, then launched a slicing shot to the right upper side of the net from 25 yards away. It was his 48th goal of the season.
“I think it helped that we got the ball to the outside,” Comerouski said. “When we got it around to the outside, we could beat the outside defenders a lot easier because it was packed in the middle.”
The Green Wave came away feeling that an inch here or there could have meant overtime or a win and berth in the Harvard Sectional.
“I told the guys that’s why they call it a game of inches,” St. Edward coach Tim Brieger said. “Two of those first-half shots go off the crossbar and it’s 2-2 at halftime.”
St. Edward (4-15-1) had a point-blank shot by Kevin Olenek saved, and Olenek had a second-half flip throw-in that sailed all the way into the net disallowed because it made contact with no one until after it had crossed the goal line by a few inches. Also, Carlos Moreno dribbled in one-on-one a minute into the second half and was stopped point blank by goalie Jack Salsgiver at the mouth of the goal.
Both teams had 18 shots on goal in the contest.
“We only started three seniors,” Brieger said. “These guys, they gave it their all. No one expected us to be here. Unfortunately for the seniors, I said it’s probably a year too early for them. We’ll be in good shape in the future.”
It was the third time Christian Liberty (20-0) beat St. Edward and second straight time goalie Jack Salsgiver got a shutout.
“Everything seemed to go our way,” Bennett said. “All the things that needed to go right did, and we finished just off good enough.”
© 2012 Sun-Times Media, LLC. All rights reserved. This material may not be copied or distributed without permission. For more information about reprints and permissions, visit www.suntimesreprints.com. To order a reprint of this article, click here.
Cell Phone Alerts
Comments Click here to view or make a comment