Lyons edges Oak Park once again

Whenever West Suburban Silver foes Lyons and Oak Park-River Forest meet on the soccer field, the game is always close and the result nearly always the same.

No. 3 Lyons continues to have the upper hand, beating the visiting Huskies 1-0 Thursday in Western Springs. The victory enabled the Lions (16-3-1, 5-0) to stay in a first-place tie with York (13-4-1, 5-0). Those two teams meet Tuesday in Western Springs for the league championship.

Oak Park (10-4-1, 4-2), which finished in third place, now is 1-8 against Lyons under coach Paul Wright. All of those matches have been decided by one goal, with three of LT’s wins coming in sectional play.

“We had a lot of adrenaline coming into this game,” Lyons midfielder Coco Corrigan said. “We knew they were a big conference opponent.

“It was a nerve-wracking game. We had to come out and play strong right away and we knew we had to be strong the whole way through.”

Corrigan assisted on the game’s only goal, which came with 5:32 left in the first half when freshman Emily Lange found the back of the net to finish a play that saw five Lions touch the ball in navigating 70 yards through the Oak Park defense.

Defender Sarah Mazur, who suffered a hip pointer in the second half but remained in the game, won the ball in the back and then Kelsey Holbert advanced it up the middle to Juliet Lusson, who found Corrigan on the right wing. Corrigan dribbled into the box and crossed to Lange, whose one-timer from 10 yards out beat Oak Park goalie Darcy Hargadon inside the right post.

“Coco made a great run out wide and she just played a great ball,” Lange said. “I was just hoping to get a foot on it and get it around the (goalie).”

The Princeton-bound Hargadon kept the Huskies in the game, making eight of her 11 saves in a first half that was completely dominated by the Lions, who peppered her with 16 shots before intermission.

The Huskies turned things around in the second half, outshooting the Lions 9-5 and creating some nervous moments for the LT defense. But junior goalie Maggie Orlowski made four of her six saves after the break while Mazur and fellow backliners Elise Gordon, Ari Kowalski and Emma Meyering stayed strong to record LT’s 15th shutout.

Oak Park’s best scoring chance was an 18-yard free kick by Emily Gullo that sailed just over the crossbar with 5:35 remaining.

“It’s frustrating but this is such a rivalry,” said Wright, whose team had a five-game winning streak snapped. “They’ve had the upper hand, so we’re just trying to gain some confidence. I felt that second half we came out there with a little bit more confidence and looked good. We had chances, which was good to see.

“The big thing is if we can probably see these guys in a sectional final, we’re going in knowing we can play. That’s a big weight off of us.”

© 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.