The Cougars, hosts of the Great Lakes Valley Conference tournament this past weekend due to their #1 seed, won their second straight title by defeating the UW-Parkside Rangers 3-2 on a goal 90 seconds into the first overtime period. The goal came from a simple play, as speedster Mike Banner took a ball down the left side and crossed the ball into the box. The clearance fell to Victor Pachecho, who fills the right midfield role in the Cougars 4-4-2 formation. His shot from outside the box seemed harmless to the goalkeeper, who assumed it was going over the crossbar. As you can see from the photo, he was very surprised when the ball bounced out of the net.
The Rangers opened the scoring, 15 minutes in, when Issam Ismaili drew two defenders and the goalie to him as a cross came in from the near side. His dummy, allowing the ball to run through his legs, led to a tap in goal by defender Greg Walasek. The Cougars equalized less than two minutes later when Dustin Attarian tapped in Randy Roy’s header that came across the front of the box.
The Cougars came out strong to start the second half but it was the Rangers who capitalized. GLVC Offensive Player of the Year, Bojan Jovicic drew a penalty kick in the second minute of the half when he was pulled down in the box after some wonderfully tricky individual play. Greg Walasek buried the PK in the roof of the net and then it seemed the Rangers began thinking about defending the lead. It worked for awhile, including a near goal line clearance by Walasek to help protect the lead. Freshman Kevin Bielicki, recently part of the CBC State Championship squad and the Scott Gallagher Region II Champions, scored the equalizer in the 74th minute when he won a 50/50 battle with the goalkeeper in the box after which he calmly slotted his shot into the back of the net.
When asked after the match if he had scored a more important goal in his career, Victor Pachecho was succint, although I’ll paraphrase him here – Heck No!
Congratulations to the Cougars. Oh, and a shout out to Chris Anzalone, Drury’s leading scorer, who was out to watch his brother John who is a member of the Cougars, and to Coach Terry Michler, CBC Head Coach, who has a number of former players on the Cougars squad.
