Naperville North defense to be tested

Updated: October 27, 2011 7:53PM

Opening the postseason riding the program’s first two-game losing streak since 2009 and at 5-4 for the second time in three years, questions abound surrounding what exactly Naperville North is capable of.

What Naperville North team are people going to see tonight as the 14th-seeded Huskies travel to play No. 3 seed Downers Grove South?

Will the team that won four straight games midway through the season, including a 17-14 victory over Wheaton Warrenville South, be on display Friday?

Or will the team whose defense has been gashed for a combined 570 rushing yards and 10 touchdowns in back-to-back losses to Naperville Central and Glenbard North show up by continuing to fail to learn from those two painful losses?

“I think we’re gonna play hard and we’re gonna fly around, like I feel we need to, like we’re supposed to,” Naperville North coach Sean Drendel said.

Although the defense has been shredded by the Naperville Central running back Matt Randolph and the Glenbard North brother duo of Phil and Justin Jackson over the past two weeks, the biggest question is who will play quarterback for the Huskies.

Junior Johnny Brown went the entire way in Saturday’s 34-10 loss at Glenbard North and played in the majority of the loss to Naperville Central the week before after senior Tyler Gehr left in the second quarter against the Redhawks. Gehr suffered an injury to his left shoulder after a 16-yard run.

Gehr, who Drendel has called the team’s leader, has tallied 1,125 total yards and 10 touchdowns as a runner more than a passer, while Brown has completed 16-of-28 passes for 251 yards and three interceptions in limited action.

“I don’t know yet,” Drendel said on Wednesday when asked if Gehr is going to play. “We’ll obviously have two different game plans.”

Whoever takes the reins for Naperville North (5-4) will be asked to help control the clock and keep Mustangs’ star running back Josh Williams off the field.

Coming into the Mustangs’ game against Addison Trail last week, Williams had been averaging 237 yards a game, but the Blazers held him to a season-low 51 yards and one touchdown on 21 carries in pinning a 20-14 upset on the Mustangs to close out the regular season, snapping the Mustangs’ eight-game winning streak.

At 5-foot-9 and 175 pounds, Williams had tallied 1,905 yards and 28 touchdowns entering the Addison Trail game and is the latest stud running back the Huskies’ defense will go up against — joining Neuqua Valley’s Joey Rhattigan, Wheaton Warrenville South’s Dan Vitale, Randolph and Phil Jackson.

“Little bit of a different style. We’ve really struggled against the guys who are bigger, more physical backs, not that we don’t struggle with anyone that can run the ball. He’s more of a scat-back type,” Drendel said of Williams. “He’ll lower his shoulder and is pretty physical. He’s got great speed. He’s really good. He’s a different type of running back than those guys, though.”

In this same spot a year ago, Williams was held to 59 yards but scored twice as Neuqua Valley upset the Mustangs, 36-22.

While Naperville North has its own workhorse back in senior Dan Puknaitis, who is 12 yards shy of a 1,000-yard season, Drendel believes his team is going to have to pass the ball more if it wishes to pull off the upset of Downers Grove South (8-1).

That may prove difficult as the Huskies’ season-high in passing were the 230 yards Gehr threw for in a 45-7 rout of West Chicago on Sept. 23. North has eclipsed the 100-yard mark in passing as a team only five times.

“That’s been most of our focus (this week) and I think we’ve been pretty good at it, so I’m excited for what’s coming up,” Drendel said.

Tonight marks the eighth time overall the two programs have seen each other in the postseason and the sixth time the programs have begun the postseason opposite each other, with Naperville North holding a 5-2 edge overall.

Both of Downers Grove South’s postseason victories over Naperville North came in first-round triumphs in 1993 and 2005 and the two programs haven’t met since the Mustangs eliminated the Huskies with a 28-21 victory in a 2005 Class 8A first-round playoff game.

“They’re a quality team. They’ve won state titles (in 2001),” Drendel said. “They’re well-coached and they know how to play the game. I’d expect them to be very physical and ready to play.”

© 2012 Sun-Times Media, LLC. All rights reserved. This material may not be copied or distributed without permission. For more information about reprints and permissions, visit www.suntimesreprints.com. To order a reprint of this article, click here.