A different kind of college achievers
On Saturday the Wheaton College football team faces an opponent with nine Division III title-game appearances in the past 10 seasons.
An insurmountable task?
Dumb question.
"This isn't like our kids have got to come up and do things they aren't physically capable of," said Thunder coach Mike Swider, whose 11-0 squad hosts two-time defending Division III national champion Wisconsin-Whitewater at noon Saturday. The Warhawks (10-1) own six titles with three runner-up spots since 2005, all against top-ranked Mt. Union of Ohio.
"We've got a good football team and to win this football game we're going to have to play well," Swider said.
If Wheaton didn't it would be news. Coming off its second straight 10-0 regular-season record and third College Conference of Illinois-Wisconsin title in four years, the fourth-ranked Thunder opened the Division III playoffs in last Saturday's blizzard with a 55-6 win over Lakeland College. It continued Wheaton's 9-0 run in first-round playoff games.
Aurora Christian graduate Noah Roberts returned the opening kickoff 55 yards to set up a quick score. Wheaton Warrenville South's Adam Dansdill, two-time CCIW defensive player of the year, returned an interception 35 yards for a 14-0 lead 1:02 into the game.
Naperville North grad Danny Puknaitis - among team co-captains along with Dansdill, a linebacker, and defensive tackle Josh Aldrin of Downers Grove South - scored on a 3-yard touchdown run to make it 28-0 at halftime.
Against No. 8 Whitewater it may be the classic formula of running the ball and stopping the run. Warhawks running back Jordan Ratliffe is 25th in the nation with 1,259 yards rushing, tied for 12th with 18 touchdown runs. Like Wheaton, Whitewater outscored its foes by a 4-to-1 ratio. Whitewater holds a 2-0 series lead, but that last game came in 1937, according to Wheaton College athletics communications director Brett Marhanka.
"We've got to stop the run first," said Swider, 170-44 since he succeeded former Wheaton coach J.R. Bishop in 1996. "We pride ourselves on offense being a very balanced football team, and we pride ourselves on a defense that's a physical team up front, that's a run stopper."
Helping the cause is Swider's own son, Wheaton North's Mikey Swider, second to Dansdill among Thunder tacklers. Both were CCIW first-team all-conference players as was Alex Mendez, a defensive back from Glenbard North.
Wheaton offers four players with more than 300 yards receiving, including Wheaton Academy's Luke Thorson; three, including Puknaitis, have run for more than 400 yards.
Johnny Peltz, another Wheaton North graduate, has shared time at quarterback with Andrew Bowers, out of Nashville, Tennessee. Left tackle Matt Snebold, a co-captain from Onalaska, Wisconsin, is a Gagliardi Trophy finalist who hasn't allowed a sack in two seasons.
Wheaton College will try to rattle another old Falcon, Lake Bachar, a Whitewater junior punter named first-team special teams in the Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference.
Whoever wins Saturday plays Dec. 5 against the winner between Ohio Northern and No. 5 Wisconsin-Oshkosh, which dealt Whitewater its sole defeat, 10-7.
"It's been a fun year," Mike Swider said. "It's been a great year with great kids. These kids have set some high goals and have played well. The goal is to keep playing. Not many teams can say they're 11-0 so that's a lot of fun."
8-1 to Yuma
The College of DuPage football team also is headed to the postseason, against Arizona Western in the El Toro Bowl in Yuma, Arizona, on Dec. 5.
"It's a big deal for us," said Chaparrals coach Matt Foster, the former Wheaton North coach. "It's a big deal for our level."
It's also a neat coaching matchup. Arizona Western coach Tom Minnick and Foster were on the same COD staff under Bob MacDougall, helping the Chaparrals to a 4-3 bowl record between 1990-96.
Foster has led COD to bowls two of his three seasons, with a loss to ASA College in the 2013 Carrier Dome Bowl.
This season COD is 8-1 and ranked fourth in the nation among National Junior College Athletic Association teams. Behind offensive lineman Jamaal Randle of Wheaton Warrenville South, the Chaparrals are among national leaders in red zone scoring. They rank second in average points allowed, 14.1.
The defense is fourth in both yards per pass and per run, and their 406 yards on interception returns ranks second in the country. COD's sole loss came against 2014 NJCAA runner-up Iowa Western.
Foster, whose staff includes former Lake Park coach Andy Livingston, former Lancers assistant Jim Salter and Wheaton North graduate Matt Rahn, is not as proud of rankings and stats as he is of a program that provides opportunities to players who might otherwise fall through the cracks. And in many cases, it moves them to larger programs.
Livingston noted that 80-90 percent of Foster's sophomores "go on to four-year schools that fund their education, from Division I to Division II and NAIA."
"We've always been more of a developmental" program, said Foster, who has freshmen Kenny Jones of Lake Park and Quintin Brown of Westmont in his stable of running backs. Matt Fletcher, out of DeKalb, is a 24-year-old linebacker who has served four tours of military service in Afghanistan.
"I think it's really a great thing having the program and what it offers kids," Foster said. "It makes it a springboard, it's a game-changer for kids. They get a degree and do something with their life."
Foster anticipates that former Chaparrals Fahn Cooper of Mississippi and Johnny Holton of Cincinnati will be drafted by an NFL team next year. He's got transfers at Syracuse, Texas Tech, Kansas, New Mexico, Bowling Green and other programs.
Because College of DuPage is a non-scholarship program, Foster gets a kick out of the fact that, because College of DuPage cannot offer scholarships his players often work part-time jobs in addition to their school and football duties, which include weekly sessions with athletes from Addison's NEDSRA Special Recreation Association.
"There's nothing given to them," Foster said. "They have to prove themselves in the classroom and on the field."
doberhelman@dailyherald.com
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