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Chicago Tribune
28-05-2025
- Sport
- Chicago Tribune
Neuqua Valley freshman Asha Kikama ensures ‘no one's going to get past her.' Not even Naperville Central.
Neuqua Valley's Asha Kikama was given a difficult assignment on Tuesday. The freshman defender had to mark Naperville Central star senior forward Callie Tumilty and had to move slightly out of position to do it. 'There's always nerves, but you gotta remember she's just a girl,' Kikama said. 'She goes to school like everyone else. So I have to bring the same intensity to her, keep her in front of me. 'As long as she doesn't shoot it, she's not going to score.' The Ohio State-bound Tumilty didn't score, mustering only two off-target shots, and neither did Naperville Central, which was shut out for the only time this season. The efforts by Kikama and other defenders like senior Chloe Orlow, plus a great goal by junior forward Alexis May, allowed the third-seeded Wildcats to upset the second-seeded Redhawks 1-0 in the Class 3A Naperville North Sectional semifinals. Neuqua Valley (16-3), which is in the sectional championship game for the first time since 2018, will play fourth-seeded Naperville North (14-5-3) at 5 p.m. Friday. 'I want to work as hard as I can for my whole team,' Kikama said. 'I have a good feeling, given that I gave everything I could have out there for my team and left everything on the field.' It's been that way all season for Kikama, who plays center back alongside Orlow. On Tuesday, though, Neuqua Valley coach Arnoldo Gonzalez had Kikama play defensive midfielder, slightly in front of Orlow. 'It was almost going back to my days and that stopper-sweeper position,' Gonzalez said. 'We just wanted that extra body in the middle playing a little bit high up. But if she needs that help, she can still tuck in.' The Redhawks (20-2-1), who had won 14 straight games since losing 2-1 to the Wildcats on April 8, nearly tucked away a goal 10 minutes after kickoff when senior midfielder Rebecca Ruggiero's header hit the crossbar. But they had few chances after that as Neuqua Valley defended vigorously all over the field, starting up top with Yale-bound senior forward Selma Larbi. 'Defensively, our plan was to just be extremely aggressive, to just go to every ball,' Larbi said. 'Then offensively, I knew I might have been outnumbered, so I just had to continue to run at them and try to force like a bad ball or like a bad kick.' The tactic disrupted Naperville Central's rhythm, and the Wildcats' confidence soared when May received a pass from freshman midfielder Caitlin King and ripped a 20-yard shot inside the right post with 37:32 left in the second half. Kikama and her teammates then held off every rush by the Redhawks. 'She was playing out of position tonight,' Orlow said. 'She stepped into the midfield, and she showed that she could play anywhere on the field. 'She's going to work her heart out out there so that we can keep the ball. Callie got nothing on her.' Larbi was impressed but not stunned. 'Asha is extremely consistent,' Larbi said. 'She's a very good player. It's not just this game. She's done well in almost every single game that we played this season. She's extremely, extremely aggressive, and it's really, really hard to get past her. 'As you can see tonight, a lot of the central attackers had a really hard time getting past her. She's just a wall, and she has the mindset that no one's going to get past her.' This mindset was even more prevalent down the stretch, when Kikama made two clean slide tackles in her box. That's a tactic rarely used at the high school level due to the risk, and Gonzalez sometimes warns her to be careful. 'But she's very confident,' Gonzalez said. 'She really reads the game well, so she's anticipating for the most part. She is never really getting stuck committing fouls. 'She plays on the edge, keeps you on the edge of the seat. But she's really good at what she does, which is anticipating and recovery.' Soccer talent runs in Kikama's family. Her father, Kividi, played at SIU-Edwardsville. Her brother Ayel, 20, played for Neuqua Valley, and her brother Aton, 16, plays club soccer. But playing great defense also requires confidence. Kikama said that comes from experience and supportive teammates. 'The bench is always cheering on everyone, and especially Chloe was telling me, 'You got it,'' Kikama said. 'Everyone is building you up together. That gives you a lot.'
Chicago Tribune
14-05-2025
- Sport
- Chicago Tribune
Marquette commit Allessandra Russo's powerful kicks give Neuqua Valley a leg up. Against Naperville North too.
On a sunny afternoon, Neuqua Valley junior Allessandra Russo was ready to unleash the thunder. The Marquette commit changed a DuPage Valley Conference game with one swing of her powerful left leg, sending a free kick nearly 50 yards into Naperville North's penalty area. 'I was just really hoping to get it far post,' she said. 'I saw that we had our runners stacked on that side, so I was just kicking and hoping someone got on it.' Russo's serve landed in a crowd. Yale-bound senior forward Selma Larbi pounced on it and scored with 19:28 left in the second half. Larbi's goal was all the host Wildcats needed to win 1-0 and claim a share of the DVC championship in Naperville on Tuesday. It was their first victory against Naperville North since 2015. Larbi, who has returned to the team after playing club soccer last year, knew Russo had the strength to get the ball to her despite the long distance. 'She hit it, and I knew that it was going to bobble in the box a little bit,' Larbi said. 'I realized that it was going up, and the defender that was on me was probably a little bit taller, so I didn't want to risk heading it. 'So I kind of waited for it to settle at my feet, and I just picked it. It was kind of just like timing.' Timing played a crucial role in Russo's transformation from standout defender to leading scorer, a shift that has coincided with the Wildcats' reemergence as an elite team. Russo had always played defense, including as an outside back on her Galaxy club team that won back-to-back national titles. But an ankle injury caused her to miss a few weeks at the beginning of last season. While she was out, Neuqua Valley coach Arnoldo Gonzalez found an adequate replacement for her on the back line. But the Wildcats needed offensive help. 'Gonzo talked about moving me up to forward and getting me chances in front of goal,' Russo said. 'So I was excited about that, and then this year especially, I've played a lot of forward.' The move has paid dividends. Russo has 11 goals and seven assists, leading the Wildcats (13-3, 4-1) in both categories. 'Even her freshman year, we knew she could be that winger because she has it in her,' Gonzalez said. 'She has the endurance to do it, so we tried that a bit last year. 'We knew right off the bat she was going to be our winger. We had our left back, and it just worked out beautifully. You know, sometimes injuries happen for a reason, right?' Russo will most likely play defender in college. But she's enjoying the chance to create goals rather than prevent them. 'It's definitely different, and I had to learn, like, to keep my composure in front of goal and make sure I didn't just sky it over,' she said. 'But I think the more I've played it, the more comfortable I've gotten on the ball in those kinds of spaces. And I think that's really helped.' Russo's play has given Neuqua Valley a confidence that had been missing in recent years. The Wildcats began DVC play by stunning Naperville Central 2-1 on April 8 and finished it by beating Naperville North (11-5-3, 3-2) for the first time since the Class 3A sectional semifinals in 2015, when they lost to New Trier in the state championship game. 'It's been so fun, and she's just helped our team a lot, especially being a left-footed threat,' Larbi said. 'You don't get a lot of left-footed players. 'I think a lot of defenders have a hard time defending her because they're not gonna realize that she can kick it with her left. So I think that makes her a really unique player.' Russo is left-footed, but her power is the result of hard work. 'I do a lot of weightlifting,' she said. 'I'll do that before school sometimes. I've weightlifted for the past two years, but I really picked it up this last two months. 'I feel like I have noticed a difference since I started that. I just developed a little bit more power.' But Russo hasn't sacrificed accuracy for that power. Gonzalez said that through 14 games, Russo had put all 28 of her shot attempts on goal. She also takes most of Neuqua Valley's corner kicks and free kicks, like the one Larbi scored on Tuesday. 'She's going to play that type of ball, and it's going to be a ball played with a purpose,' Gonzalez said of Russo. 'She definitely gets our offense going.'
New York Times
08-04-2025
- Entertainment
- New York Times
When a High School Fight Tears a Community Apart
From the first page of Sameer Pandya's timely and timeless new novel, 'Our Beautiful Boys,' we're dropped into a series of contradictions. We're introduced to a town that's described as 'nothing extraordinary,' but then ushered to a trio of caves cloaked in mystery and lore. We're told these caves are very old, but then we focus in on contemporary dramas. Thus, the tone is set — here is a novel that carefully plays with assumptions, expectations and subversions. At the center of the novel is Vikram Shastri, an Indian American 11th grader living in Southern California, who is recruited for his high school's football team. Vikram's parents, Gita and Guatam, are none too thrilled — American football is an undeniably violent sport. And as the family's cherished photo of Vikram's great-grandfather marching with the Mahatma Gandhi illustrates, violence of any type is not the Shastri way. But Vikram wants to play. As he pursues the sport, he finds himself thrust into a wildly unexpected alliance with two other boys: Diego Cruz, an 11th grader of Latin American descent who, pressured by his single mother, plays in the hopes that football will land him a full ride to college; and MJ Berringer, the Yale-bound senior quarterback who is actively wrestling with the privilege inherent in being white and wealthy. As it turns out, all three boys have unpleasant histories with another kid around school: a troubled outcast named Stanley Kincaid. And those unpleasant histories come to the fore one fateful night. Looking to celebrate a football victory, Vikram, Diego and MJ attend a party at an abandoned house in the hills outside their town, and while exploring the aforementioned caves, which are nearby, they have a physical altercation with Stanley. After the fight, they flee the scene, and when Stanley finally emerges sometime later, the boys see that he's terribly hurt, with wounds that far exceed what the boys say they inflicted. Stanley claims that one of the three boys returned alone and is responsible for the most severe of his injuries, though he's not sure which one because it was dark and he was intoxicated. And with that, we're thrust into a series of events that force the characters, their parents and the reader to grapple with the ways the boys' different backgrounds impact their experience of being accused of wrongdoing. Is this a book about race relations? Absolutely and from multiple directions. It's also a book about class. And immigration. And opportunism. And gender. And marriage. And parenthood. And America. These are big, familiar topics, but Pandya's approach to unpacking them stands out. First, it's not Black and white (racially) nor black and white (morally). Racially, with its cast of Latino and Indian characters, the book urges us to reckon with the ways nonwhite Americans view and engage with one another. And morally, the novel doesn't offer clear or easy answers. Pandya presents flawed but understandable people trying to navigate a murky situation with high stakes: the futures of these boys. The second thing that stands out is Pandya's gorgeous yet understated storytelling. The book's tone highlights that the struggles in 'Our Beautiful Boys' are not exceptional dilemmas but rather uncomfortably common situations. Above all else, 'Our Beautiful Boys' is a book about the lies we knowingly or unwittingly tell ourselves. This is a book that highlights how we internalize and project certain perceptions, and what we're willing to do and say so we can feel accepted. In this way, the three caves, as stark and mysterious as ever, are not just a setting but also a metaphor. Vikram, Diego and MJ are just as opaque as those rocky tunnels; they haven't even begun to explore the depths of who they are. I was reminded with every twist and turn in this story — and they are plentiful — that each of us is a cave of our own.
