Pigskin practices open at all 27 DuPage high schools
DuPage County’s 27 high school football teams all got fresh starts Wednesday during the official first day of practice.
So what if last season ended one dive play shy of the end zone with 2.8 seconds left in the first round of the playoffs — as it did for St. Francis against eventual 2010 Class 5A state champion Montini.
Players in helmets ran their offenses under bright sun and patchy clouds, amid a welcome breeze and 73-degree temperatures. The welcome respite from summer’s swelter included a springlike sense of renewal.
“Close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades and dancing, and we left the ball on the 4-yard line, and I’m sure we all remember that. But that was last year,” said St. Francis coach Greg Purnell during a break between the Spartans’ morning practice sessions.
“This day means routine,” Purnell said. “It puts you in a three-month routine where you are thinking about football an awful lot, you’re thinking about kids an awful lot.”
As Purnell well knows, having led St. Francis to the 2008 Class 5A championship, the football season is actually a four-month proposition around here, from mid-August through Thanksgiving weekend.
At least one DuPage team has won a state title each year since 2001, capped last season by two-time defending champs Montini and Wheaton Warrenville South.
The competition is so heated, so highly regarded, that the Aug. 28 season opener between Glenbard West and WW South, who battled in the 2009 7A championship, will be broadcast live from Grange Field on ESPN2. The visiting Hilltoppers offer Rivals.com’s No. 1 player in the state, 300-pound defensive tackle Tommy Schutt, who on Wednesday was belting dummies as if they were Tigers.
Naperville Central last season missed the playoffs for the first time since 2002. Returning to norm is one reason — along with the IHSA-allowed 25 contact days of summer and a year-round emphasis on conditioning — Redhawks coach Mike Stine fielded 98 hungry players on Wednesday.
“Back in the day, you show up and some of your team you hadn’t seen all year. We’ve been with these guys all year. It’s the official start, but really the way football has evolved, the football season actually started months ago,” he said.
That may be true, but the first day of practice offers possibility. And to many, urgency.
“It is a big deal,” said Redhawks senior quarterback Ian Lewandowski.
“I’ve got to take each day at a time and just make sure that I get my work in each day, not take it for granted because it’s going to go by fast. Then it’s going to be over.”