Girls soccer regionals are just around the corner

Whether it’s closing out a conference title quest or just finishing the regular season strong, none of the area coaches want their players looking too far ahead, but with the IHSA revealing the postseason pairings, it’s time to take a peek.

The IHSA determined seeding based on the entire Waubonsie Valley Sectional, which has almost all of the area teams within four regionals. A trio of schools has regional prelims on May 13, but most start on either May 17 or May 18.

No. 20 seed East Aurora has a prelim date at Bolingbrook, which is hosting a regional. That match winner faces No. 4 Waubonsie Valley in a May 17 early semifinal followed by a pairing of No. 12 Oswego East and No. 5 Downers Grove South.

No. 17 West Aurora has a may 13 prelim at No. 16 Plainfield East as part of the Neuqua Valley Regional with the winner facing the No. 1 seed Wildcats on May 17. That regional’s other semi is a May 18 contest between No. 8 Benet and No. 9 Wheaton Warrenville South.

No. 15 Oswego hosts a May 13 prelim with No. 18 Downers Grove South as part of the Naperville North Regional. The prelim winner meets the No. 2-seeded Huskies in the first May 17 semi with the second matching No. 7 Metea Valley with No. 10 Lockport.

The other regional host is No. 3 Naperville Central, which opens with a May 18 semi against the winner of a prelim between No. 19 Romeoville and No. 14 and Plainfield Central.

Shipped over to the Lake Park Regional are Batavia and Geneva. Batavia is a 12 seed within the St. Charles East Sectional and faces No. 7 Lake Park in the second semifinal after No. 4 Geneva takes on the winner of a prelim between Glenbard East and Elgin.

Don’t forget the 2As

All of the area’s 2A programs have to battle it out within the Rosary Regional, which begins with a May 13 prelim in which No. 4 Aurora Central Catholic hosts No. 5 Yorkville. The winner faces No. 1 Rosary in a May 17 semifinal. The May 18 semifinal has No. 2 Kaneland facing No. 3 IMSA.

All-tourney accolades

In addition to capturing a gleaming trophy at Moline’s State-Line Challenge tournament thanks to a 1-0 win over Iowa’s Pleasant Valley, Batavia had four players named to the all-tournament squad in Hannah Schweigert, Breanna Choffin, Meagan Reinecke and Chelsy VanOvermeiren.

Earlier this season, some other area players did the same at DeKalb’s Barbfest with all-tourney medallions going to Yorkville’s Jenny Taptich and Brittany Straznickus, Hinckley-Big Rock’s Lauren Paver and Alyssa Baunach, plus Indian Creek’s Leigh Creiger and Gretchen Tyler.

Area leaders

Kaneland’s Emily Heimerdinger is undoubtedly an offensive force as demonstrated by her No. 1 status for points (55) and goals (22) and No. 2 standing for assists (11).

Rounding out the top five in points are IMSA’s Alex Smick (45), West Aurora’s Jessica Saffell (31), Oswego’s Cathy Tram (29) and Indian Creek’s Gretchen Tyler (29). For goal scoring, it’s the same folks: Smick (19), Saffell (14), Tram (12) and Tyler (11).

IMSA’s Rae Hohle is the area set-up leader with 12, one ahead of Heimerdinger, who is followed by Kaneland teammate Jessica Coia with eight. Five players own seven assists: Geneva’s Catherine Allon, Waubonsie Valley’s Megan Green, West Aurora’s Reilly Kulakowski, plus Smick and Tyler.

Geneva goalie Victoria Fortney has 6.5 shutouts based on five solo clean sheets and three shared shutouts, while Oswego East frosh Hannah Gargrave is next at 5.5.

© 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.