By Mike Clark
When Lane rallied from a three-goal deficit to take a lead against Young/Rauner in the Public League final on May 3, Yahoo Jimenez wasn’t worried at all.
“We were thinking too much,” the Young/Rauner junior said. “We wanted to play (at) their level. (But) they can’t compete with us. No one can. When we’re in sync, when we’re playing together, we’re one of the toughest teams to beat in state. … We’ve just got to play our game.”
After falling behind 5-4 late in the second quarter, Young/Rauner did, finishing on a 7-2 run to win 11-7 at the UIC Natatorium.
Jimenez scored six goals and Miguel Pintor added a pair for Young/Rauner (21-5), which won its second straight Public League title and eighth overall. George Ivascu had three goals and Brayan Ruiz added two for Lane (24-4), which was seeking its first city championship.
Lane rallied after falling behind 4-1 after one quarter, scoring four straight to go ahead 5-4 on Ivascu’s second goal at 2:01 of the second.
“It was a rough second quarter,” Young/Rauner coach Angelo Espinoza said. “We had to come out and actually play our game. We were playing too much into their game. So we decided to stop swimming; we’re not a swim team. Decided to eventually play water polo.”
Jimenez stepping up is nothing new — the junior leads the team with 69 goals.
“He’s easily been our best player,” Espinoza said. “He scores the ball, but a lot of times they don’t see the little things he does, like drawing the exclusions.
“Even though he’s small, scrawny, he can play some ball.”
Winning city back-to-back and for the seventh time since 2016 was no surprise to Espinoza.
“This is the same group we had last year,” he said. “They’re battle-tested, (took) fourth in state last year. … Even when Lane went on their little run and got up on us, that didn’t faze them. We’ve been there before.”
The rivals could meet again in the Lane Sectional, where Young/Rauner is top-seeded and the host Champions are No. 2. Young/Rauner is seventh and Lane 12th in the Illpolo.com state rankings.
“We’ve got to play them one more time and they’re gonna be hungry,” Espinoza said. “They’re gonna be ready to play so we’ve got to play 10 times better than we did today.”
Jimenez is looking forward to the IHSA playoffs.
“What really matters is state,” he said. “We’ve got the guys to do it and these are the only guys I want to do it with — this family.”
Last year’s postseason run set Young/Rauner up well for this year.
“We’ve just got more experience, more chemistry with each other and more grit,” Jimenez said.
Curie/Kelly/UIC Prep 20, Kennedy-Hancock 7: Freshman Joaquin Alvarez scored six goals and sophomore Kevin Gama added five as Curie/Kelly/UIC Prep (15-12) took third. Javier Cruz led Kennedy/Hancock (15-6) with three goals.
Photos by Andrew Rosenthal/OSA
