Addison Trail produced the biggest evidence yet of its massive improvement, defeating perennial conference power Downers Grove South 1-0 on Tuesday.

Ishmail Hernandez’s third goal of the season (assisted by Rodrigo Cobos) provided the margin of victory midway through the first half for the Blazers (4-3-6, 2-2 in the WSG), and the usual strong defensive corps of Ali Abdalla, Zach Busse and Axel Salvo was helped by two other standouts.

“Diego Araoz made a game-saving play at the end on a semi-breakaway,” Blazers’ coach Pete Ginter said. “He got a foot on the (Mustang) shot at the last second and deflected it just wide of the goal. And we started our No. 2 goalkeeper Juan Herculano today and he played a wonderful game against a very tough opponent. It was a last minute decision, and when I told him he said, ‘coach, I’m ready to play.’ You could see the confidence he had, and he came through. It was a heroic effort on his part.

“We tried to pull our defense back and shut off a lot of their chances,” Ginter added. “It’s something that worked against Hinsdale Central (an early season tie), and it worked in this game as well. The guys are starting to learn how to win. We haven’t consistently played our best, but today we did, and we had to in order to beat this quality of team.”

The Blazers had a surprising battle in a 4-3 win over Proviso East on Monday in which Cobos scored two goals and Hernandez and Julio Lopez had one. Addison Trail rallied from a 2-0 deficit Saturday to tie Wheaton-Warrenville South 2-2 on goals by Carmelo DeFranco and Cobos.