North Chicago 24, Antioch 20
Antioch's football team has a 1,000-yard rusher in Cameron White as well as another good running back.
Despite Steve Lorenzini's 3 touchdowns, however, the Sequoits dropped their season finale Friday night.
North Chicago won 24-20 on DeShawn Chambliss' 39-yard TD pass to Marquise Miller with 50 seconds left in the fourth quarter.
Lorenzini's 14-yard run put the host Sequoits up 20-18 with 6:19 remaining.
Chambliss threw 3 TD passes on the night. Miller also had a 50-yard reception.
Under first-year head coach Brian Glashagel, Antioch finished 3-6 overall, including 1-5 in the North Suburban Prairie Division.
North Chicago finished 4-5, 3-3.
Huntley 40, Grayslake C. 0: Midway through the season, Huntley coach Steve Graves decided to make some adjustments to his team's offense.
"We knew that we had a lot of running backs so we just decided to stick to the run the rest of the season," Graves said. "The kids played real good football the last two-thirds of the season and we were hoping that they would go out like that."
"That" would be 290 yards on the ground, as the Red Raiders shut out host Grayslake Central 40-0 in the teams' Fox Valley Conference Fox Division football game Friday night.
After starting slow, Huntley finished the season at 4-5 overall and 3-2 in the division. Grayslake Central finished at 0-9 overall and 0-5 in the FVC Fox.
Graves pointed to his offensive line for his team's late-season success.
"We have linemen that make nice holes for our backs," Graves said. "Tonight we were running behind Grant Hamilton, our center Brandon McDaniel and our right tackle J.J. McDougall. Each played a great game for us tonight."
Junior back Jordan Neukirch led the barrage for Huntley with 131 yards on 10 carries and a touchdown.
"We had a rough start to the season," Neukirch said. "It was the seniors' last game of the season, so we wanted to leave it all on the field for them."
Huntley's defense also dominated, allowing only 115 rushing yards and 42 passing yards, while intercepting three passes.
Austin Drougas played a good game both on offense and defense.
He rushed for 56 yards and scored on a 30-yard interception return.
Neukirch capped a 37-yard drive in the first quarter by scoring from 7 yards out.
After the Red Raiders kicked off, Drougas made his interception to make the score 14-0 with 8:33 left in the first quarter.
Running back Rich Smith led Grayslake Central with 123 ruishing yards.
"Obviously this is not the way we wanted to end the season," Rams coach Nick Goshe said. "The seniors didn't play their best in the first half and then it was too little too late to end the game.
But we did get a little look at the future. We have to do a lot of work in the weight room during the off-season."
-- Irv Solomon