Injuries hurt Sabres in setback to CL Central

Key injuries plagued the Streamwood Sabres as the Crystal Lake Central Tigers took control of Saturday's nonconference season opener in the second half and downed the Sabres 34-21 at Millennium Field.

The first of two injuries came in the first quarter after sophomore Derrick King went down after catching the first Sabre touchdown on a fourth-and-long pass from Noel Rivera, which tied the score at 7.

"He's got a nice frame and good speed. You have to to make varsity as a sophomore," said Streamwood coach Cal Cummins. "We don't know how serious (the injury) is. It could be devastating for us."

Streamwood held tight with Central ending the first half only down by a touchdown at 21-14, but the second injury occurred near the end of the third quarter as Nick Seng intercepted the first pass from Gabe Roman, who came in after Rivera limped off the field after a sack. Rivera did return for the fourth.

"Gabe came in and was a little excited and misread the play," Cummins said. "That certainly was a key point to the game."

With the touchdown, the Tigers took their first two-possession lead of the game, but after a 15 yard TD run by Kevin Wohlhart, the Sabres had 9:31 left to try and tie it.

However, Tigers coach Jon McLaughlin made a gutsy call to sink the final nail in the coffin as the Tigers executed a fake punt on a 4th-and-3 play.

"I was thinking if we should punt for it or not, and we called a time out and the kids said 'there's a huge hole, call a fake,' " McLaughlin said. "I just told them they better get it."

Trevor Parlberg made the 4-yard run for the first down.

Even with the loss, Cummins was encouraged as the Sabres led the game in passing yards as well as turnover ratio at 3-1.

"We thought after the first half that we moved the ball and we could score on them. We thought we might be able to stop them on defense," he said. "Mentally, we weren't as sharp as we needed to be to get a win."