Scouting Elgin at Streamwood

Elgin (1-1) at Streamwood (1-1)

When: 7:30 p.m. Friday at Millennium Field

Last year: Elgin 21, Streamwood 12

Last week: Streamwood 27, Dundee-Crown 12; West Aurora 23, Elgin 7

Outlook: The winner of this contest between District U-46 rivals positions itself as a playoff contender with the meat of the schedule straight ahead. This is the River Division opener for both teams in the new-look Upstate Eight Conference. The Maroons have won the last five meetings in this series since 1999. "No question this game means a lot to us," said Streamwood coach Cal Cummins. "It's a game we have at home against a solid opponent, and we're coming off a win last week where we did some things well. If we come out and put together back-to-back wins, it could be a confidence builder for the rest of the season. I see it as a very interesting matchup. We both have some backs that can run the football and we both have speed guys." Said Elgin coach Dave Bierman: "Both teams have big-play potential, but we have to execute better on offense than we did last week. I thought the defense played pretty well other than a couple of breakdowns, but the offense didn't execute as well as we needed to." Elgin senior running back Jordan Dean used his speed to turn a short pass into a 41-yard touchdown last week but was otherwise limited to 2 more catches and 33 yards rushing. The Maroons passed for only 80 yards on 23 attempts. Elgin could benefit from facing the same 3-5 defensive scheme for the second week in a row. The Sabres ran to victory last week behind junior running back Alex Morrow's school-record 300 yards on 41 carries. "He showed a lot of glimpses of his abilities last year," Cummins said. "The only thing we tried to work with him on was getting him to finish his runs because too many times he was stood up and pushed backward. He's made it a focus to finish his runs for positive yardage and it's paid off. Now he's running for 5 yards and looking for more."