Naperville North shuts out West Chicago
The Naperville North offense was the nasty thorn in the Wildcat's paw.
After West Chicago and North traded three and outs on their respective series, Huskies quarterback Matt Manade tossed a screen pass to senior running back Nick Mlady, who scampered down the right sideline for 76 yards and the first Huskies score. It was the first of many for Mlady and the Huskies as they trounced West Chicago 42-0 in DuPage Valley Conference action Friday evening.
"We stuttered out of the gate a bit," said Naperville North coach Larry McKeon. "Our goal is to always score on our first series. But we made a nice play on the second play of the next series."
Naperville North (4-0, 2-0) struck again in a 5-play, 1:36 drive after forcing the Wildcats into another quick three-play series. This time it was the legs of senior Pat Waite that carried the Huskies down the field. Waite uncorked a 30-yard run that set up a Mlady touchdown, giving the Huskies a 14-0 advantage early in the first quarter.
"He's a good player," McKeon said of Mlady. The Huskies coach also spoke glowingly of his offense line, that protected Manade and enabled the Huskies rushing attack to roll up 458 total yards.
"We don't pat the offensive line on the back enough," he said.
Mlady led the Huskies attack all night, rushing for 3 touchdowns and picking up 2 more through the air. He finished with 268 yards total, 165 being on the ground.
"Everybody did their job tonight and busted their butts," Mlady said.
West Chicago (1-3, 0-2) was the victim of stalled drives that started with promise. Senior quarterback AJ Romanelli threw for 136 yards, and senior receiver Chris Jackson had 3 receptions for 58 yards. But it was wide-open receivers dropping passes and costly penalties that eventually doomed the Wildcats.
"I was really on our guys hard at the half," West Chicago coach Hal Chiodo said. "We just didn't execute out there. We weren't making routine plays and it cost us. It could have been 21-14 in the third quarter had we just made our plays."
McKeon agreed with Chiodo's assessment.
"They were right there with us," he said. "They had a lot of wide-open receivers, and we're certainly going to have to tighten that up this week."