MILWAUKEE – The Alverno soccer team returned home following Saturday's match and returned to the win column with a 3-2 victory over the Rockford Regents as the Inferno picked up their first conference win of the season.
The Inferno had three different goal-scorers as sophomore Shaye Wolfe opened the scoring with the lone goal of the opening half. Sophomore Ziri Hernandez-Bustos had the assists on the first-half tally.
The second half saw goals by sophomore Angela Chobanian as well as freshman Katie Shipley, as Wolfe had the helper on both tallies to put Alverno up by a 3-0 score. A late scramble by the Regents allowed Rockford to score twice in the final four minutes but it was not enough as the Inferno held on for the victory.
At halftime, the Inferno recognized lone senior Mackenzie Mathies for her two-season career with the Inferno as both a freshman and a senior. With tomorrow's match withstanding, Mathies has two career assists and over 1,800 minutes played in 22 matches. The team also recognized graduate assistant coach Lisa Collogan, who will graduate from Alverno in the spring of 2020.
In goal for the Inferno, freshman goalkeeper Kenzie Bermudez did not register a save but did pick up her fifth victory of the season as the team matched its win total from a season ago.
After a fairly evenly matched 39 minutes to open the game it was Alverno to score first as Hernandez-Bustos brilliantly slotted a ball between two defenders to find a wide-open Wolfe, who buried the ball into the corner of the net for the opening tally of the contest.
As play shifted to the second half, Wolfe chipped a ball towards the left wing to find Chobanian, who punted the ball into the upper left corner of the goal past a diving Rockford goalkeeper to give Alverno a 2-0 lead.
Wolfe was credited on the assist on Alverno's third goal as she dribbled the ball up the middle forcing the second center back of Rockford to clamp towards Wolfe leaving Shipley all alone on the right wing. An alert Wolfe placed the ball off to her right allowing Shipley to beat the Regent goalkeeper to put Alverno up by three.
Rockford scored with 3:28 to go in the match to shrink Alverno's lead to two as a free kick rang off the crossbar, with the rebound falling straight down to the head of a trailing Rockford player, who headed the ball into the goal to give Rockford just their second conference goal of the season.
A scramble in front of Bermudez was chaotic as the Inferno were credited with their only save of the match as freshman Sami Martinez headed the ball out of harm's way momentarily. However with the ball bouncing around inside the box, Rockford was able to sneak the ball into the goal with just a handful of ticks remaining on the clock.
Alverno eventually held on for the victory, as the team picked up its first conference win since the 2016 season when the Inferno knocked off Lakeland in September of that campaign.
Alverno (5-13-0, 1-10-0 NACC) will wrap-up the season tomorrow afternoon, when the Inferno host Benedictine for a 3 p.m. start on the Alverno Soccer Field.
