Now that the Bolingbrook Raiders have put the finishing touches on the third undefeated season in school history, The Brook must wait and see how the playoff seeds break down when the IHSA releases the brackets tonight.
Friday night's 29-0 win at Lockport was all the Raiders (9-0) could do. The rest is outside their control.
"It means we've got the number one seed in 8A, in our bracket," Brook coach John Ivlow said. "So, that was very important to us."
Bolingbrook is not the only undefeated team in Class 8A. Entering the weekend, the Brook led the pack in playoff points with 38.
Defending 8A state champion Naperville North beat previously unbeaten Wheaton Warrenville South 7-6 on Friday night to win the DuPage Valley Conference and improve to 9-0.
Sun-Times No. 1 Maine South (8-0) hosts Niles West (3-5) today at 1 p.m.
Bartlett (8-0), which needs to win to clinch its first undefeated Upstate Eight title, had its game at East Aurora (2-6) postponed last night due to lightning. They will play today at 11 a.m.
So the Raiders may be the overall No. 1 seed when the IHSA announces the Class 8A pairings at 8:45 p.m. Maybe not. I'm not going to try to figure out all the different possibilities when one of the official methods of assignment is "random selection by computer."
Ivlow said he won't be logged on to his laptop or watching his television tonight.
"We'll start working on that on Sunday," Ivlow said. "I got a few parties to go to (Saturday), so I'm just going to enjoy friends and family."
Slogging through soup
The constant rain on Friday night created a extremely muddy surface on the natural grass field at Lockport. The field was already chewed up before the game started from a season of games, but once the rain began to fall, it got sloppy.
After the game, covered in mud and bits of grass, Bolingbrook linebacker Marcus Lee had no complaints.
"I think, personally, this was the best game I've ever played in, in my life," Lee said. "It was a lot of fun. I've never had so much fun in my life. I've never played a mud game before, you know, we've got the turf. So it was the funnest game I've played in my life."
Ivlow stressed to the running backs during position drills to use their outside foot to make cuts. He said at least once, senior John Seigler didn't heed that warning.
"Just in general, if you don't plant off your outside foot when you cut, a lot of guys slip and fall," Ivlow said. "Those are those phantom tackles. People say, "was there a sniper in the stands or what?" Johnny cut off his inside foot once today and went right down on his hip, so that's why we tell them. That's why I was telling them about this mud. You really have to use that outside foot to plant."
Wide receiver Chris Williams seemed to get along fine as he made numerous cuts on punt returns, epecially during his 76-yard touchdown return in the second quarter. Williams, who also had a return TD against Lockport last year, stayed on his feet and left the slipping to the Porters (4-5).
"It wasn't that tough," said Williams, who aslo caught a 24-yard touchdown from Brad Geever in the first quarter. "I didn't slip at all this game. Usually I slip a lot in grass, but I kept my footing."
While he didn't slip, Brook kicker Nick Knutson didn't fare well on his first extra point attempt, which wobbled wide left.
"It was wet, I didn't concentrate and I let things get to me," Knutson said. "The line, they did everything perfect, a beautiful job. It was a fault on my part. I didn't keep my head down. I let the pressure get to me and I didn't make it."
The Raiders went for a 2-point conversion on their second touchdown, but Knutson made his other two PATs as well as a 24-yard field goal in the fourth quarter. As for the playoffs, Knutson said he would practice at Bolingbrook's old grass field if the Raiders have a playoff game on grass with wet weather expected.
"I would go on my own time and do that," Knutson said. "I've seen how it effects me and I need to be ready for that. Because missing those, it could have cost us the game and that would have been my fault. And we can't have that happen."
30-minute delay
Because of a few flashes of lightning to the East, the scoreless game was put on hold with 1:57 to play in the first quarter. The teams were sent off the field and the fans, media and workers were sent out of the stadium.
So how did the Raiders spend the delay?
"Real loose. We got a real loose group," Ivlow said. "They just sat in there and talked about the weather and about what they had for lunch. Real loose. It was too early in the game to make any adjustments. So we were really just waiting for the game to start. So we kept it loose and were killing time really."
The spectators were told to either go to the fieldhouse or to their cars. During the 30-minute intermission, Bolingbrook athletic director Alec Anderson said he wasn't sure who at Lockport would make the decision to potenially reschedule the game for Saturday because Anderson said the Lockport AD wasn't at the game.
Thankfully, that wasn't necessary. The storm didn't really pass, and there was at least one more flash of lightning as the teams were given three minutes to warm up, but the game was restarted.
Maybe in round two
Junior defensive tackle Brandon Tucker had his left arm in a sling with his shoulder held in place with a pad between his arm and his stomach due to the injury he suffered in Bolingbrook's win at Sandburg last week.
Tucker told The Brook Blog that he separated his shoulder and tore his labrum. He will be evaluated again in 10 days and hopes to return for the second round of the playoffs.
"I've got to get back," said Tucker, who is tied with Bryan Mesik for the team lead with four sacks. "I don't want to be out of this season."
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