Devin Wong’s stunning strike helps Lyons turn away Downers Grove North upset bid, take regional title

WESTERN SPRINGS – Lyons senior Devin Wong made sure that his final home game was memorable for all the right reasons.

With his team locked in a scoreless draw with upset-minded Downers Grove North, Wong stole the ball in his own end and began a counterattack.

Less than 15 seconds later, he ended it, scoring a goal after working a 70-yard give-and-go with sophomore midfielder Hayden McTigue.

The stunning strike against the run of play with 19:36 left in the second half was all the host Lions needed as they held on to win their own Class 3A regional 1-0 on Saturday at Bennett Field.

The fifth-seeded Lions (13-7-2) advance to face top-seeded Morton in the Reavis Sectional semifinals at 4:30 p.m. Tuesday.

“It feels pretty good,” Wong said. “It’s a great way to end playing here.”

It was by no means easy. The 13th-seeded Trojans (4-19-1) had taken the Lions to double overtime before losing 1-0 two weeks before and then upset fourth-seeded Young 1-0 in the regional semifinal.

“Those boys are good,” Wong said. “We got stuck in a dogfight with them two weeks ago.

“I didn’t want to get stuck in a dogfight with them again. They’re competitive, but as soon as we got that wind, it was game-changing.”

Indeed, after not getting any shots off against the wind in the first half, the Lions began to slowly turn the tide in the second half.

“We were very aware of this game being a potential battle,” LT coach Paul Labbato said. “They came out and were certainly on fire and they could have had some goals.

“I thought with the wind and seeing what they were being better at during the first half, as coaches I think we were able to give them ideas on how we could sustain some pressure. We know with some sustained pressure we will eventually find something that could look like a goal.”

When the goal finally came, it was a beautiful scene. Wong won the ball just outside his own penalty area and raced up the right side before sending a long diagonal ball ahead to McTigue.

“I took a look up, saw this dog (McTigue), played him the ball and just knew it was going to come back to me,” Wong said.

Wong kept running after passing the ball and snuck into open space as McTigue took on a defender in the left side of the Downers North penalty area.

“I just saw some open space up the field and I just ran into it because I’ve done that plenty of times before and it works,” McTigue said. “Once I got the ball, I was a little bit hesitant if I wanted to go and take a shot or cross it.

“Then I saw Devin out of the corner of my eye, so I took it down the line and played it across.”

Wong was there for the easy tap-in.

“When I heard the press box saying it was Devin Wong, I was like, ‘He made a run from center?’” Labbato said. “I didn’t realize it was him that won the ball and started the process.

“Then he kept running, which we ask kids to do, so I was pretty excited.”

Wong was excited, too, because the Lions haven’t had the best of luck scoring in transition. Counterattacks were a point of emphasis in practice.

“That’s what we did all week,” Wong said. “One of our struggles has been getting that ball when it’s coming back, and we worked on that all week and we were able to capitalize today.”

The Lions outshot the Trojans 6-0 with the wind at their backs in the second half and were dominant in the final 20 minutes, hitting a crossbar and a post.

But the Trojans were a bit unlucky not to have scored first in the first half. A shot from Kobi Marquez hit the inside of the left post and skittered untouched across the crease with 27:35 remaining, and 15 minutes later LT goalkeeper Matt Peterson made a diving save on Grigore Onica.

It was Downers North’s 10th one-goal loss of the season.

“Like we told the kids, we’ve shown that we’re a much better team than what our record is,” Downers North coach Rafal Slomba said. “But soccer is a cruel game if you don’t put the ball in the back of the net.

“I would say the first 20 minutes of that second half was really dictated by us. Then I think we just started to unfortunately lose our legs a little bit. One mistake, one counter and they put the ball in the back of the net.”