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44 | September 29, 2016 | The orland park prairie Sports
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Girls Tennis
Lockport duo’s aggressive play overpowers Sandburg
RANDY WHALEN
Freelance Reporter
Taking a first glance at Lockport
Township girls tennis doubles
partners Gabby Perillo and Kamile
Sulkson, one can’t help but notice
a bit of a difference in something.
Their height.
While separated by over 10
inches in height, the junior duo is
as tough as they come on the court.
They showed that again last week
in pulling out a key match at No.
3 doubles. That helped the Porters
to a big 4-3 team victory over
SouthWest Suburban Blue rival
Sandburg on Thursday, Sept. 20, at
Lockport.
With its second win over a
SWSC Blue opponent in less than
a week [the other was a 6-1 win
on Sept. 15 at Homewood-Flossmoor],
Lockport (15-1-1, 3-0) put
itself as the favorite to win the
conference tournament. That takes
place between Thursday, Oct. 6,
and Saturday, Oct. 8, at H-F.
The loss was a rare one for Sandburg
(5-2, 1-1), which was coming
off winning its own invite the Saturday
[Sept. 17] before.
A key match in the Porters win
was certainly Perillo and Sulkson.
In a close contest they defeated seniors
Jenna Gonzales and Elisabeth
Wood 6-3, 7-5.
“I wasn’t sure if it would work,”
Lockport coach Bob Champlin
said of the pairing of Perillo and
Sulkson. “But it did.”
The two are now 14-1 on the season.
“Opposites attract,” said Sulkson,
who is 5 feet 8 1/2 inches tall,
about her pairing with Perillo, who
is 4 feet 10 inches tall. “It’s different
playing styles and it took
awhile, but we got the hang of it.
“I’m better at staying back, but
we’re good at setting each other up.”
Perillo agrees.
“We stayed really aggressive at
the net,” Perillo said of the strategy
against Sandburg. “They try to hit
it over me, but [Sulkson] backs me
up. We didn’t play together a year
ago. We had to work really hard
together in the offseason. It may
have taken some time, but we did
it together.”
Both teams have done very well
together this season. Of Sandburg’s
trio of wins, two came at singles.
Those were a 6-1, 6-0 victory at
No. 1 singles by sophomore Anna
Loureiro over freshman Natallie
Barth, and at No. 3 singles freshman
Jayme Gross won 6-0, 3-6,
6-2 over senior Jessica Sterna.
“She’s a good player and I just
played really well,” Loureiro said
of facing Barth. “I just stayed focused
and whatever happened,
happened.”
Good things usually happen for
the Eagles when Loureiro is on the
court. She helped them capture the
title of their own invite by winning
the first singles title, one of three
on the day for Sandburg.
“To win the invite felt good
and we all played well,” she said.
“We’re really getting into a great
mindset as a team. We know what
we have to do and we go out and
practice with a purpose.”
The Eagles also captured the longest
match of the night in terms of
time. That was a 7-5, 7-6 (7-5) win
at No. 2 doubles by junior Agnes
Florczyk and senior Stephanie Garoufalis
over junior Kaitlyn Graves
and sophomore Bri Hillock.
“We [had] three really big
matches [last] week,” said Sandburg
coach Brian Ostrander, whose
team traveled to Marist on Wednesday,
Sept. 21, and hosted H-F on
Thursday, Sept. 22. “It’s tough to
come on the road and win at Lockport.
Their No. 1 doubles team is
tremendous and our No. 1 singles
player is tremendous.
“We’ve got to get to work on the
lower levels. But you can’t win the
conference [last week]. It’s going
to come down to one day [Saturday,
Oct. 8 at the SWSC Blue Tournament].”
Cassidy Hillock had Lockport’s
win at singles. That was at No. 2
where the sophomore was victorious
6-3, 6-2 over freshman Julia
Canellis. At No. 1 doubles it was
the Porter duo of seniors Mary
Kate Buchheit and Tomi Jo Mansell
with a 6-1, 6-2 win over seniors
Jasmine Abunaim and Sophie
Sjo. The No. 4 doubles duo of junior
Lauren Hasler and sophomore
Maddy Grcevic had a 6-1, 6-4 win
over freshman Konstance Delis
and junior Sam Warchol.
“This was a team win,” Champlin
said. “We won at the top and
bottom of our lineup.
“Our No. 1 doubles had a good
win and a good match. Our No. 2
doubles losing might be good in
retrospect, because often times you
learn more from a loss then a win.”
Sandburg sophomore Anna
Loureiro — who had a 6-1, 6-0
victory over Lockport Township
High School freshman Natallie
Barth — plays Thursday, Sept. 20,
in Lockport.
Julie McMann/22nd Century Media
Players from the two teams may
very well see each other again this
weekend. Lockport hosts another
invite at 3:30 p.m. on Friday, Sept.
30, and continuing at 8 a.m. Saturday,
Oct. 1, and the Eagles are there.
Boys Soccer
Griffins look to improve after falling 4-0 to Eagles at home
Frank Gogola
Freelance Reporter
Sandburg coach Desi
Vuillaume opened the team’s
postgame talk with a question:
“Why are we only good
in the second half?”
Several players blurted
out answers. Some were inaudible.
None were acceptable,
Vuillaume would say
several minutes later.
“You guys are going to
get rolled if we don’t start
picking things up in the first
half,” assistant coach Scott
Wilkins told the team. “Otherwise,
it’s not going to be
good. It’s going to end quick
for you guys in the playoffs
if you don’t starting picking
it up in the first half.”
This was the talk that a 4-0
win over Lincoln-Way East
on Thursday, Sept. 22, had
earned Sandburg (5-6-1).
The Eagles have scored 25
goals on the season, but only
eight have come in the first
half. They’ve picked up the
pace with six of their eight
first-half goals in the past
four games, but Vuillaume
wants to see improvements
with conference play beginning
and regionals less than
one month away.
“We settle in too quick
and we just don’t see that
fire,” Vuillaume said. “We
need to play the whole 80
minutes like what we saw
in the second half. It should
have been 4-0 at the half.
… We haven’t found what
motivates this team yet, but
we’ll get there.”
East (2-7) has had its own
problems this season. The
roster of nine East players
and 12 former Lincoln-Way
North players have struggled
to mesh together.
“We haven’t figured out
how to play with each other,
and we’re fighting each
other,” said East coach Ryan
Decker. “Not that we’re literally
fighting each other,
but in the game there’s no
chemistry, no flow. … We’re
just not applying what we’re
doing in training to those
game moments.”
Decker sat three regular
starters in the first half because
they showed up late
to the pregame meeting. He
pulled captain Liam Elsden
and Spencer Hein in the 57th
minute after they got yellow
cards for talking back to a referee.
Both instances, Decker
said, were symptoms of the
Griffins’ losing problem.
“Respecting the refs, the
opponent, the game itself is
one of the principles I’m trying
to teach these guys about
character,” Decker said.
“That’s not character. Yeah,
you’re frustrated; you’re losing.
If you don’t like it, fix it.
Yelling at the refs isn’t going
to fix the problem.”
Sandburg sophomore forward
Colin Kroll and senior
midfielder Frank Connelly
were cleared from injuries
that Thursday. Kroll, who
leads the team in scoring
despite playing only four
games, didn’t play. Connelly
got hit in the head while contesting
a header in his first
minute of action and spent
the rest of the game on the
bench in what Vuillaume
called a precautionary move.
The Eagles got the first
three shots on goal, but Marko
Nedeljkivic had a prime
chance to put East up 1-0
in the eighth minute. East’s
Nicholas Conces drew Sand-
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