A championship mindset: Circle of success keeps spinning at North Central College
(Second of two parts)
During the long climb to the top of Division III, North Central football experienced the ultimate full-circle moment.
Current head coach Brad Spencer was on the two-person player committee that helped interview candidates when John Thorne was hired in 2002.
Thorne left his job as football coach and chemistry teacher at Wheaton Warrenville South High School and began the task of turning North Central into a football dynasty. The Cardinals (14-0) have reached their fifth straight Stagg Bowl and will try to secure their third national title against Mount Union on Sunday in Houston (7 p.m., ESPN).
In 2002, Spencer was halfway through his playing career at North Central when he and teammate Jeff Wink helped hire the coach that sparked the massive turnaround.
“That was the best part of the interview,” Thorne said. “The first part, we had all kinds of people there asking questions and professors asking how I was I going to be able to teach a class. When I finally got to sit down with the two players, then that was fun.”
It turned out to be a package deal, because Thorne brought his son Jeff along as offensive coordinator. Jeff Thorne played for his father in high school, joined the quarterback tradition at Eastern Illinois, then spent 13 years working as a financial planner.
Jeff kept his full-time job in finance for seven years while also calling plays for the Cardinals. He finally stepped away from financial planning in 2009 to focus solely on coaching.
So let's continue the timeline from Part 1. When we left off, North Central made its first trip to the Division III semifinals and lost an epic 41-40 decision in a snowstorm at Mount Union.
2014: North Central finishes 8-2 and misses the playoffs. John Thorne resigns as head coach to spend more time with his wife, Kathie, who was battling cancer.
Jan. 1, 2015: Jeff Thorne is named head coach.
2015: The Cardinals miss the playoffs again in Jeff Thorne's first season, finishing 7-3.
Jeff Thorne: “I just knew we had to do something a little bit different than what we'd been doing. We were so close. We just needed a little bit more in the way of leadership.”
Thorne brought in a group known as “The Program,” former Navy Seals who put the team through two days of challenges.
Thorne: “They take the team through some pretty intense training. Not all physical, a lot of it is more mental. I had heard great things about them and it blew me away the difference they made. That really changed the mindset of our team, but also our coaching staff, I think. It was good for all of us.”
2016: Neuqua Valley grad Broc Rutter transfers to North Central after spending a year at Indiana State. With freshman Rutter at QB, the Cardinals go undefeated until losing to rival Wheaton in the second round of the playoffs.
2018: After two years at Benedictine, Shane Dierking returns to North Central as defensive coordinator. For the third year in a row, the Cardinals fall in the second round of the playoffs. A 27-24 loss to Bethel (Minnesota) on Nov. 24, 2018, remains their most recent home defeat.
Nov. 30, 2019: Despite a regular-season loss to Wheaton, North Central makes the playoffs and this time, the second-round assignment is a return trip to Mount Union.
Jeff Thorne: “Physically, we matched up with Mount Union fine in 2013. So it was an easy conversation to have with our team. 'Guys, look, physically we're no different than them. Let's go out and execute and we can beat this team.'”
With Rutter throwing for 522 yards, and wide receiver Andrew Kamienski (South Elgin) piling up 256 receiving yards, North Central rallies in the second half to take a 59-52 lead. As the clock winds down, Mount Union has first-and-goal at the Cardinals’ 10-yard line. Six years after playing his final college game on the same field, Dierking is calling the defense tasked with keeping Mount Union out of the end zone.
Dierking: “The last play of the game, I was like, 'Do I bring everybody or do I drop everybody?' Luckily I dropped everybody and we rushed three and one of our defensive linemen brought some pressure.
“Our guys did a great job of passing off a cross-country concept and our boundary corner (Jake Beesley) intercepted it and that was a historic moment for our program. I was just relieved to get off that field. It was pure relief for about an hour or two, then it was excitement.”
Dec. 14, 2019: North Central rolls to a 45-14 semifinal win at Muhlenberg (Pennsylvania).
Dec. 19, 2019: Rutter becomes the school's first Gagliardi Trophy winner, which is basically the Division III Heisman. North Central has won the award three more times since, with running back Ethan Greenfield (Lakes) getting the trophy in 2022, while QB Luke Lehnen became a two-time winner on Saturday.
Jeff Thorne: “Broc was unbelievable, Luke Lehnen is unbelievable. What took the program over the top was the combination of what I talked about with the military-type training and a new mindset. Also just a real commitment to developing and recruiting offensive and defensive linemen at a different level.
“Back when we were chasing Mount Union and Whitewater, we had good linemen. We didn't have enough of them to provide depth if a guy gets injured. That to me is where you're seeing North Central's dominance right now on the line of scrimmage as much as anywhere else. My dad called them, ‘the real football players.’”
Dec. 20, 2019: North Central beats Wisconsin-Whitewater 41-14 to win its first national championship.
Since the regular-season defeat to Wheaton in 2019, North Central has gone 67-2, with the only losses coming in the Stagg Bowl in 2021 and '23.
Jeff Thorne resigned after the 2021 season, spent a year as offensive coordinator at Western Michigan, then went into private business, while watching his son Payton play quarterback at Auburn the past two years.
Spencer hasn't left North Central since enrolling as a freshman in the fall of 1999 and is trying to carry on the winning tradition, with two more former players, Dierking and Eric Stuedemann, as the coordinators. Spencer sits at the same desk as John Thorne, the coach he helped hire.
“I've lived my entire life within 7 miles of my desk,” Spencer said.
The circle is complete, but it's still spinning.