BRAIDWOOD -- The Reed-Custer High School football team held Coal City to four total yards and cliched the Interstate Eight Large championship in a 26-0 victory on Friday night. Quarterback Casey Barnes threw three touchdown passes -- two to Steven Davis and one to Jake Bolatto. Davis also rushed for 100 yards on 10 carries for the Comets (6-2, 4-1). Coal City (5-3, 3-2) punted six times and last three fumbles on nine possessions. | |
Sandwich 15, Reed-Custer 14 ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
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Reed-Custer 49, Peotone 14 Ryan Garbin rushed for four touchdowns and racked up 165 yards on 22 carries and the Comets raced out to a 21-0 lead in the opening game of the Interstate Eight Large season for both teams. The Comets totaled 323 yards rushing in the game and improved to 3-1 overall. ________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Reed-Custer blows out Peotone PEOTONE -- If this whole football coaching thing hadn't worked out for veteran Reed-Custer High School coach Dean Cappel, he might have been just as successful as a cobbler. Cappel is doing a spectacular job piecing together a sparse roster and getting maximum effort from his few brave warriors as the Comets absolutely demolished host Peotone on Friday night by a 49-17 score. Reed-Custer (3-1, 1-0 Interstate Eight Large) worked through a week of practice where it had less than 20 able varsity bodies and Cappel's ability to adjust on the fly came in handy for the team. "We lost a guard last week before the game and we've still got two or three guys on the sidelines we're hoping to get back," Cappel said. "The kids just responded. They knew it was the first conference game and we had a lot of respect for Peotone. And we knew they had some weapons. But our running attack was our best defense tonight in keeping their offense off the field." The Comets established their game plan almost immediately and after squelching a promising Peotone drive by recovering a fumble, Ryan Garbin made his presence felt. Garbin, who barely cracked the area's top 20 in rushing last week, touched the ball on four of Reed-Custer's first six plays capping the drive with the first of his four touchdowns on the night from three yards out. He'd also finish with 165 yards rushing. Garbin has a simple explanation for his offensive outburst. "It was the offensive line," Garbin said. "It was all about the line." Reed-Custer opened the second quarter with a flurry of productivity. The Comets would score on a 36-yard touchdown strike from Casey Barnes to Chris Robinson on the second play of the quarter and would then score again just moments later on a Garbin 10-yard run after the Blue Devils (2-2, 0-1) fumbled away the kickoff. A big play by Joe Kottmeyer allowed Peotone to slice into the lead when he plucked a loose ball off the turf and ran it in for a touchdown. But Reed-Custer wasted no time responding when Garbin blew past the Peotone defense for a 35-yard touchdown jaunt that once again put the Blue Devils in to a desperate catch-up mode. The Blue Devils did manage to make the score a little bit more respectable when Andrew Hagemaster crashed in from the 1-yard line just before the half time, but the Comets would execute a soul crushing drive to start the third quarter that ate up tons of clock time and ended with a 1-yard touchdown plunge by Barnes. Garbin would add his fourth and final touchdown of the game before the frame was concluded. "Ryan Garbin just looked awesome tonight," Cappel said. Neither team would do much more damage on the scoreboard but the game was marred by penalties and sloppy play all around. Both team amassed double digit miscues as the two teams combined for nearly 200 yards of penalties. "Just last week we were really in disarray," Cappel said. "We had 18 or 19 players all week and I was scared to death coming over here. In some places, I've only got one guy. But we're not bad. And if we get a couple of these people back, we could surprise some people." | |
GAME 3 | |
Wilmington 21, Reed-Custer 0
The Wildcats (3-0) have allowed just six points in three games and have held opponents scoreless in 11 straight quarters. Reed-Custer (2-1) finished with negative 7 rushing yards. Colin Webb, Josh Bailey and Zach McWilliams had touchdown runs for Wilmington. _________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ BRAIDWOOD -- A football play, when it goes awry, is often referred to as being ten seconds of panic by the affected offensive players. But for Reed-Custer High School's quarterback Casey Barnes, it must have felt like he had a lot less than 10 seconds to work with when things didn't go his way. Barnes spent most of its night running for his life, trying to stave off the advances of a relentless Wilmington High School defense that stretched its consecutive unscored upon streak to 11 quarters during a 21-0 Wildcat shutout on Friday. Wilmington (3-0) sacked Barnes nine times in the game and the Wildcats didn't allow the Comets to get into positive yardage until the fourth quarter. Even then, Reed-Custer finished with a scant 24 yards to their credit. "Honestly we were outmatched up front against them early on, but we made some quick adjustments and we were able to take them up front," Wilmington coach Jeff Reents said. "A lot of people were telling them before the game that with the rain it might slow us down. But we played tough and maintained our keys for all four quarters." Reed-Custer (2-1) tried to monopolize the game clock by grinding out the ball on the ground. It worked somewhat on Reed-Custer's opening possession and Wilmington didn't get many chances with the football. But when they did manage to get the ball away from the Comets they were highly effective with it., needing just eight plays to finish off the drive with a touchdown as Colin Webb snuck in from the 1-yard line. "It was nice to get on the board early," Reents admitted. "When you come out and get a quick seven it kind of relaxes you and then defensively we can be aggressive and really go after people." Reed-Custer actually attempted an unorthodox tactic of running clock while trailing and managed to keep the ball away from the Wildcats for much of the second quarter. However, when the Wildcats did get the ball back, they wasted no time scoring quickly on a 41-yard touchdown run by Jeremy Bailey. With a two touchdown advantage that allowed the Wildcats to really cut it loose on defense and the results were rather impressive. "They really have the personnel to run that 3-5 defense and they are just going to get better as the year goes along with it," Reed-Custer coach Dean Cappel said. "I really feel like they are the class of this league." Reed-Custer's roster has been depleted severely because of injuries and before reserves arrived from the junior varsity game the Comets only had 22 able bodies set to go for the varsity contest. "I don't want to take anything away from Jeff and his team, they have an excellent ballclub," Cappel said. "I thought we had things figured out, but in hindsight we just didn't have enough time to run our offense." Neither team played with much of a killer instinct in the second half as the steady rain continued. Wilmington did manage to tack on another score on a 41-yard breakaway by Zach McWilliams. Reed-Custer never seriously threatened to score and the only time the Comets spent deep in Wilmington territory was because of a Wildcat fumble on a punt return. | |
GAME 2 | |
REED CUSTER 26 SENECA 19 SENECA -- The Reed-Custer High School football team mounted a furious rally late and emerged with a 26-19 overtime victory. Reed-Custer fell behind 19-12 with 1 minute, 25 seconds to play after a Seneca touchdown, but answered quickly when Chris Robinson hauled in a 53-yard pass from Ryan Albin to tie the score and force the extra period. The Comets scored a touchdown on a 7-yard scramble by Casey Barnes and the Comets defense was able to keep Seneca from scoring an equalizer. Garrett Sandefur led the Comets offensive attack by rushing for 60 yards on 11 carries. ____________________________________________________________________________________________
Bag of tricks Veteran coach Dean Cappel had to dig very deep into his bag of tricks to give his team a chance to claim an overtime victory over Seneca in Week 2. Time was running out with the Comets trailing Reed-Custer by a point. Instead of kneeling down to run out the clock, Seneca punched in another score. After missing the extra point attempt the Irish led by seven. With just over a minute to play, Cappel went to a reverse where Ryan Albin got the handoff. Albin then sold the run long enough to convince the Seneca defensive backs that it was run. Albin then stopped and heaved a pass to Chris Robinson who had slipped behind the Seneca defense. Robinson scored on the play added the extra point and sent the game into overtime. Casey Barnes then scored an overtime touchdown to provide the decisive margin for Reed-Custer, now 2-0. "We have a few tricks up our sleeve," Cappel said. "I don't like to do that kind of stuff, but sometimes you just have to do what you have to do." | |
GAME 1 | |
Reed-Custer 21, Lisle 12 At Braidwood, Reed-Custer quarterback Casey Barnes scored three rushing touchdowns and Derek Albin made a key fumble recovery in the fourth quarter. |