Teonic's Hersey debut a raucous success
Even Oak Lawn's quick 14-0 start in less than four minutes wasn't going to spoil the debut of the new Hersey football coach and his newly energized players.
With a capacity crowd in the Hersey stands and music blaring during timeouts, the revitalized Huskies stormed back for a 47-14 triumph in the coaching debut of Dragan Teonic.
Once the final horn sounded, the student body gathered en masse near the south gates of the field chanting "Dragan! Dragan! Dragan!" after he led the Huskies to their first opening-game win since 2005.
"It's crazy, they love him," said Huskies senior running back Chris Polinski, who rushed for 107 yards in 15 carries after playing only two games last season due to illness and a sprained ankle. "He's great. It's a completely new offense. It's nuts. He knows what he is doing on every play. He reads defenses so well."
And he had a quarterback executing like a poised veteran behind a line that included Tyler Kamp, Sean Thompson, Jason Olson, Zavier Henry and Jackson Smith.
Junior signal caller Brad Zaucha passed for 4 touchdowns and ran for three, connecting on 11-of-19 attempts for 157 yards with TD passes of 29, 21, 10 and 16 yards to Polinski, Justin Jobski, Billy Borst and Alex Vaile.
"Our coach has brought so much excitement to the program," Zaucha said. "We are so pumped for the future under him. It started with the defense playing so well. They were unbelievable giving us great field position every time."
Seniors Peter Alsip, Fred Scales and Olson were among those who helped spark the defense.
"I think we might have the greatest student body in the northwest suburbs," Teonic said. "It was unbelievable they were so pumped up. These kids aren't used to that and that put some pressure on them early.
"I thought Brad settled down real nice and he was very efficient. He was like 9 of 10 in the first half. He did a great job to come back from the early adversity."
Oak Lawn marched 69 yards on its game-opening drive, then recovered a fumble at the Hersey 20 and scored three players later for its 14-0 lead with 8:39 left in the first quarter.
"Then we started to turn the ball over, had some penalties and they capitalized," said Spartans coach Ron Thornburgh. "They out-coached us and their kids outplayed us.
"Their passing game didn't surprise me but their running game did. He's (Polinski) the real deal. One of my biggest fears coming in was that they'd have a good player in that spot, and they did."
"He's the best kept secret in the Mid-Suburban League," Teonic said. "I've been trying to talk about him to the media and everyone but no one wants to listen."