Scouting Round Lake @ Lakes

Round Lake (0-6, 0-4) at Lakes (3-3, 2-1)

When 7:30 p.m. today

Last week Round Lake lost to North Chicago, 30-8; Lakes lost to Libertyville, 35-17.

Skinny Round Lake may be winless and may be giving up 33.6 points per game, but its defense can give an offense fits. "Actually, Round Lake will be one of the most aggressive defenses we'll play all year," Lakes coach Luke Mertens said. "They send a lot of people on blitzes and they'll have their guys play right in your receivers' faces. It's a lot to prepare for."-Round Lake gave North Chicago all it could handle last week and had tied the game at 8-8 early in the fourth quarter on a 5-yard run by running back Edgar Rivera and a 2-point conversion by quarterback Anthony Gutierrez. That was set up by a big defensive play by Jorge Venegas, who scooped up a North Chicago fumble and ran 82 yards before being brought down at the Warhawks' 5-yard line-But after all the excitement, the Panthers eventually broke down and North Chicago scored 22 unanswered points over the final nine minutes. "We're getting better, but we're still confusing effort with results," Round Lake coach John Coursey said after the game-Lakes made quite an effort in getting back into last week's game against Libertyville. The Eagles were down 28-7 at halftime but scored 10 points after the break. Tyler Menheer scored on a 6-yard run and kicker Mike Beckman, who has been solid all season with 9 made field goals, booted a 39-yard field goal. The Eagles' other touchdown came on a 95-yard kickoff return by Andrew Tubek in the second quarter. "We played a really good opponent in Libertyville," Mertens said. "But we also didn't make it easy on ourselves. We had 7 penalties and they had one. We fumbled twice inside our own 10-yard line, and they scored both times. On the first drive of the game, we were having to start on the one-inch line. The positives are that we know we made a lot of mistakes that are in our control to fix."