Key takeaways: Big plays save Belvidere North, lack of power running game hurts Boylan

Time of possession is irrelevant unless you are protecting a late lead. What matters is it's close cousin — the number of plays you run.

But sometimes even that doesn't matter. Wauconda ran 75 plays from scrimmage with its fast-moving option attack to only 40 for Belvidere North, but North won 28-21 Saturday.

"I didn't count the plays, but one of their ball carriers had 30 carries by himself so it doesn't surprise me," North coach Jeff Beck said. "They were really good at running the Wing T. We have not seen a Wing T since Hononegah stopped running it back in 2015 and moved toward the spread. They got on the ball quick and had us on our heels but we were able to make some stop at the end of the game."

North won with three big plays. It stopped a long Wauconda drive at the 2-yard line. Nico Bertolino ran 98 yards for a TD on the next play. And Bertolino scored the winning TD on a pick-6.

"We've had to live by the big play," Beck said. "Those two plays (by Bertolino) were the difference in the game."

Lack of power running game bites Boylan

Boylan averaged 142 yards rushing this season — the first time the Titans have been below 200 since 2017. With Connor Dennis finishing first or second in the NIC-10 in passing three straight years, it didn’t always matter. Like Belvidere North against Wauconda, Boylan capitalized on big plays. But in its two tough regular-season games, against Hononegah and Belvidere North, it was a combined 5-for-20 on third down and 0-for-4 on fourth. It scored two of its three TDs against Hononegah on passes of 62 and 63 yards.

Boylan simply lacked the power running game it has had in basically every other season. That hurt the Titans in short-yardage situations — like when they couldn’t score after driving 95 yards to get a first-and-goal at the 2 in a scoreless game that would turn into a 35-7 loss to Elmhurst IC Catholic.

“In the two games we lost, we ultimately abandoned the running game,” Boylan coach John Cacciatore said. “We were calling for it, but the conflict is patience. How long can I stay with it? When you are down 21 points, every run felt like we were missing an opportunity for a 15-yard gain. When we were moving the ball, we were moving it in chunks.”

It’s hard to get chunks when you can’t convert short-yardage situations to give you three more downs to take a shot. That was Boylan’s Achilles' heel this year: not running well enough to play ball control.

Hononegah keeps it all in the family

Since Hononegah switched from a wishbone running attack to a balanced spread offense, its starting quarterback has been the son or grandson of a Hononegah coach seven out of eight years.

Ryan VanSchelven began the trend when he took over as a sophomore late in the 2016 season. His grandpa Donn is Hononegah’s all-time winningest coach (77-37 in the 1980s) and his uncle, Scott, had the second-best receiving season in NIC-10 history with 1,143 yards in 1987. His dad, Ryan, was Hononegah's quarterback in 1989 and is currently an assistant offensive coach for Hononegah. Isaac Whisenand was a two-year starter at QB. His dad, Kurt, is an assistant at Hononegah and held the NIC-10 record for passing TDs in a season for over 20 years with 22, also in 1987. And current quarterback Cole Warren, who has a chance to break the league TD mark, is the son of current offensive coordinator Jeremy Warren, who graduated from Hononegah in 1991.

“We’ve got the pedigree up here,” Hononegah coach Brian Zimmerman said. “We’ve got alum offspring to captain us at quarterback. I am not sure if there is anybody in the pipeline right now or not, but we’ve got a lot of junior tackle kids who are the sons of alums.”

That includes a son of former NIU star linebacker Kevin Selover, who was famous in high school for qualifying for state as a heavyweight wrestler and also as a hurdler in track.

Second- and third-generation stars are a big advantage for Hononegah. The best athletic families staying true to their school happens a fair amount in area small schools — notably the Considine and Elsbury families for Byron, all the Alber wrestlers at Dakota — but is rare among Rockford Public Schools.

“It’s a huge advantage,” said Jeremy Warren, who was the head coach at RVC and East earlier in his career. “It speaks to people wanting to stay around the community and raise their kids there and hopefully someday have them play for Hononegah.”

Byron headed toward tough semifinal

No. 1-ranked Byron is bidding to become the most dominant team in state history, outscoring foes 665-52 en route to this week's Class 3A quarterfinal against Durand/Pecatonica (9-2). Du/Pec played mostly a 1A schedule in the NUIC regular season. But Byron could play Lombard Montini in the semifinals. Montini has not only won six state titles since 2009 and finished second three more times, but all nine of those state championship appearances came in a higher class (4A, 5A and 6A). This year, Montini (8-3) has played schools that averaged 1,204 students in the regular season, almost triple Byron's 471 average. And those schools are 8-3 in the playoffs this year vs. the 2-5 showing of Byron opponents. Most impressively, Montini beat LaGrange Nazareth, which knocked off No. 1-ranked Crystal Lake Prairie Ridge in the first round and is still alive in the Class 5A quarterfinals.

NUIC is more than a great Class 1A league

When Forreston and Eastland/Pearl City won the Class 1A and 2A state titles in 2014, Forreston QB Robert DeVries said: “There’s no conference like ours.” That gets more apparent with every passing year. No. 1-ranked Lena-Winslow is favored to win the conference’s seventh consecutive Class 1A state title this year. It is hard to make that résumé look even more impressive, but Durand/Pecatonica is doing just that.

Du/Pec is the league’s only 3A team. The Rivermen (9-2) lost 42-0 to Le-Win. But they have back-to-back playoff wins of over 30 points against the Big Northern’s Oregon and Stillman Valley in Class 3A. The NUIC is far and away the best Class 1A conference in the state. But Du/Pec’s run indicates three-time defending state champ Le-Win would probably even be a title contender in 3A. Now that is true greatness.

Contact: mtrowbridge@rrstar.com, @matttrowbridge or 815-987-1383. Matt Trowbridge has covered sports for the Rockford Register Star for over 30 years, after previous stints in North Dakota, Delaware, Vermont and Iowa City.

This article originally appeared on Rockford Register Star: Key takeaways for Belvidere North, Boylan, Hono, Byron, Du/Pec