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soccer a 'team sport' as althoff girls bring home state title

By LIZ QUIRIN
Messenger editor

Team work: That’s the watchword that the coaches of Althoff Catholic High School award-winning girls’ soccer team want everyone to remember.

“They played as a team the whole season,” head soccer coach, Juergen Huettner said.

The Althoff team not only finished its season with a 27-0 record, the girls brought home the 2A state trophy when they beat an Arlington Heights, Ill., team for the honor.

For their part, the girls said they played some tough teams, and the game against Belleville West stands out, perhaps because of the rivalry between two teams in the same town or maybe because the team lost to West last year.
Down 2-0 at the half, the team battled back to win the game 5-3.

Two of the coaches, Huettner and assistant coach, Steve Dinges had daughters on the team.
With their daughters playing on the team, the games were really “special,” they said.

Perhaps “being good Catholics helped us out,” Huettner said, and smiled, adding “I’ve never had a team like this.”
By that he was talking about the way no one on the team tried to take center stage, or more specifically no one tried to upstage another girl on the team.

Stacking win on top of win, Dinges said, every win painted a bigger bull’s-eye on their backs as each opponent tried to be the team that brought them down. It didn’t work.

Assistant coach Laura Schumacher a 1998 Althoff graduate and now on staff as a religion teacher, said she never imagined going into the season that the team would have a perfect record.

While “the girls kept their perspective pretty well,” Schumacher said, “I got a little jittery.”
She said she prayed a lot, and sometimes sat on the sidelines with her hands folded in prayer.

Parent Jane Nesbit said she wasn’t anxious but ever vigilant with her twin daughters, Madeline and Maureen playing, especially since Madeline was the goalie.

Sometimes the games could be “heart stopping,” she said. Both Jane, and her husband, Walter, are Althoff graduates.

Nesbit said the couple may attend some of the soccer games next year as their daughters go on to college on volleyball scholarships, but it would be “just for fun.” No pressure.

Thinking about the season and the state championship, Nesbit said she wasn’t sure if the girls understood the significance of their season.

“They don’t know how special this is yet, but they will,” she said.

With six seniors graduating, next year will be a time of rebuilding.
And while Coach Huettner wonders if he will ever see another team quite like this one, the future holds all kinds of possibilities.

Following is the 2010 varsity playoff roster for Althoff’s award-winning soccer team:
Seniors: Tess Huettner
Heidi Koehl
Madeline Nesbit
Maureen Nesbit
Kelsey Panzau
Megan Pawloski
Juniors: Danielle Birk
Kelsey Dinges
Mary Geiger
Missy Muckensturm
Kayla Ord
Kayla Panzau
Trisha Quinn
Kelly Quirk
Sophomores: Emily Beyersdorfer
Sydney Ditzler
Kelly Minor
Freshmen: Maddie Elbe
Megan Gillum
Emily Jackson
Alexis Jones
Elizabeth Mueller

Congratulations to the team and coaches on an extraordinary season.