The Lake Forest Boys Varsity Soccer team finished their regular season 9-4-5 with a win over Vernon Hills. A big win over Libertyville and last minute ties with Stevenson and Lake Zurich resulted in the Scouts winning the North Suburban Conference for the first time in 11 years.
The Scouts first playoff game is against Deerfield on Wednesday at 7 p.m. at West Campus. If they win, the Scouts will play for the Regional Championship against the winner of Crystal Lake Central and Carmel on Saturday at West Campus.
This year’s team has noticeably improved from the year before. Last year, the Scouts allowed 42 goals and only scored 25. This year, the team scored 39 goals while only allowing 20, mainly thanks to their strong defense. Their style of play leaves them confident ahead of their first playoff game.
“We’ve done a nice job defending not only near the penalty box, but also at midfield which has stopped other teams from developing their offense at all,” said Head Coach Rob Parry. “Forcing turnovers at midfield has helped us create quick opportunities to score. When you only allow around 1 goal a game, it gives you a great chance to win.”
As a result of their strong regular season, the Scouts landed a six seed in the Grayslake Central Sectional, matching them up against Deerfield, whom they lost to earlier in the season. Despite the tough draw to begin the playoffs, the team is determined to avoid repeating their early-season mistakes.
“We played very poorly in the first twenty minutes against Deerfield earlier in the season, which mainly led to the loss,” said senior captain Boden Rupprecht. “Since then, we’ve grown a lot as a group. We now understand what our team does well, and what is needed to win games.”
As a result of their work all season, the Scouts are feeling hopeful about making a run. They are working non-stop during practice and in the film room in preparation for the game. Their matchup will ultimately come down to sticking to what has been working all season.
“Not only have we gotten better at developing our passing game and building up from the back, but we’ve also been mixing things up by going long and not allowing teams to get set up to defend us,” said Parry. “Our attack now has a lot of variety, so we need to concentrate on that against Deerfield.”
