Battle of Ridge Road - Part II

Updated: March 22, 2011 5:10PM

A second meeting in the same season between two good football teams carries a certain appeal.

Will Team A, which won the first meeting, be able to impose its will this time around? Will Team B, which came out on the short end the first time around, make the adjustments necessary to reverse its fortunes?

The questions will be answered Saturday when Plainfield South hosts Minooka at 6 p.m. in a Class 7A second-round playoff matchup.

The game is one of seven second-round battles involving area teams, and all seven will be played Saturday.

In addition to Minooka at South, our other 7A game is Lincoln-Way East at Glenbard West at 1 p.m. In 6A, Lemont will entertain Geneva at 6 and Danville is at Lincoln-Way North at 7. Joliet Catholic is home for a 6 p.m. matchup against Sterling in 5A, while Lincoln-Way West travels to Peoria Richwoods for a 1 p.m. game.

Finally, in 3A, Aurora Christian, which is quarterbacked by former JCA signal-caller Anthony Maddie, will be at Wilmington at 7.

Plenty of tough assignments in the mix for our local teams, and plenty of reason for the local fan base to contend with butterflies this week.

We will take a look at all the matchups in more detail later in the week. But for now, what about that Minooka at South game?

I had the opportunity to cover Minooka in its 26-7 win over Quincy last Saturday. The Indians trailed 7-0 at halftime, so the victory certainly was not a gimme.

But what Minooka did that day was win with defense and special teams. Any time you can block three punts and your opponent has a fourth where the snap was high and the punt never was attempted, chances are you will wind up in pretty good shape.

Max Brozovich, Jake Residori and Alex Hamilton did the honors on the punt blocks. Brozovich also tackled the Quincy punter at the 2-yard line on the play where he ran out of the end zone after the high snap.

The Quincy defense rose to the occasion and prevented Minooka from scoring after both of Brozovich's big plays in the first half.

But when Residori and Hamilton got their blocks in the second half, the Indians cashed in. Residori's block came when the score was 7-7 late in the third quarter, and Hamilton's followed.

Those big plays from the special teams were converted into touchdowns, and the Indians were on their way back up Ridge Road to Plainfield South.

The Southwest Prairie adversaries first met in Week 5, and in the final analysis, South's speed proved fatal to Minooka.

However, was it simply a matter of the Cougars running faster, or was it as much about the Indians not being properly positioned to defend the South spread offense?

We shall see. Minooka coach Bert Kooi, who helps run the defense, indicated after the Quincy game that his team will be much better prepared to face the spread this time. Part of the reason is the reason was the number of spread teams the Indians faced after going against South.

For sure, Minooka cannot afford to give up the number of big plays the Cougars delivered in Week 5 and expect to stay in the game.

The Indians are on a roll of late, not only in winning five straight games, but in finding different ways to win. The defense was a big part of the win over Quincy and will have to be a major element against South.

From the Cougars' perspective, they know they need to defend the Minooka running game even better than they did in the first meeting, and they need to continue to make enough big plays on offense to turn the tide in their direction.

South has its big guns back playing and relatively healthy, so the Cougars will be a handful for Minooka or anyone else to handle.

No more news yet on East St. Louis and the IHSA. It may happen that the Minooka-South winner will meet the mighty Flyers in the quarterfinals. Or not.

Nothing ho-hum about these playoffs.

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