Football: Team comes first for hard-working Matt Randolph

Updated: November 26, 2011 5:40PM

Through its first 12½ games this season, Naperville Central had certainly looked adversity straight in the eye at certain times, only to come out better and stronger on the other side.

Why should have that been any different when encountering perhaps the most critical juncture of its season?

Finding itself trailing for the first time on Nov. 19 in its Class 8A state semifinal against Bolingbrook midway through the third quarter and in desperate need for a play, Naperville Central’s workhorse delivered, much like he had times and times before.

Electrifying a red-clad Memorial Stadium crowd with an acrobatic 42-yard catch and run over the middle, punctuated by a leap into the end zone, senior running back Matt Randolph offered some renewed vigor and hope that the Redhawks’ surprising season just might continue one more week down in Champaign.

Although Randolph would fail moments later on a two-point conversion attempt, the Redhawks would go on to take a 19-14 lead early in the fourth before eventually losing 22-19.

Winning nine games in 2011, its highest victory total since 2004, Naperville Central returned to the state semifinals for the first time since 2001 largely as a team, but the contributions that Randolph, the 2011 Naperville Sun Prep Football Player of the Year, made toward that end are unquestionable.

“Matt was everything. He was the legitimate offensive leader of this whole team,” Redhawks’ senior quarterback Ian Lewandowski said of his running mate in the backfield. “He has been our captain since last year. There’s nobody like the kid and I wouldn’t want any other running back in the state.”

Proving to be one of the better dual-threat backs in Illinois, Randolph tallied 2,121 yards and 28 touchdowns of total offense on his way to earning DuPage Valley Conference Offensive Player of the Year in 2011.

A year ago, in the midst of the program going through a rough 4-5 season and missing out on the postseason for the first time since 2002, the 6-foot-1, 215-pound Randolph burst onto the scene as a junior in gaining 902 rushing yards and seven touchdowns on his way to garnering unanimous All-DVC first-team honors.

Ever the modest superstar and team leader, all he was concerned about coming into this season was the team’s success as opposed to focusing on his individual numbers.

All the motivation he and his teammates needed was their 4-5 record from 2010 and their desire not to become the first senior class in program history since 1984 to miss out on postseason play in both of their varsity campaigns.

“It was really painful,” Randolph said back on Aug. 10, the first day of practice, of the 2010 season. “We don’t want to be the first senior class to not make the playoffs (in) our two varsity seasons. That’s another huge motivation. Sitting around here watching teams win state championships, go deep in the playoffs. That’s where we wanted to be. It was very frustrating.”

Eight 100-yard rushing games, three 200-yard rushing games and a trio of five-touchdown games later, he did his part to try and make that a reality as he finished up the season with 1,736 rushing yards and 22 touchdowns on 252 carries.

Needing only four games to match his 2010 touchdown total of seven, Randolph went through a little bit of a lull midway through the season, much like the rest of the offense.

In a three-game stretch against Wheaton Warrenville South, Glenbard North and Wheaton North, the offense scored a combined 24 points in a stretch that saw the team lose to both Wheaton schools and barely eke out a victory over Glenbard North.

Entering its annual matchup with crosstown rival Naperville North on Oct. 14 at 4-3 and off the heels of not scoring an offensive touchdown in a 14-7 loss at Wheaton North, Randolph took off.

Finding paydirt on the ground five times for the second time, he ran wild against the Huskies for 253 rushing yards on 18 carries in a 36-26 Naperville Central victory, evoking memories of what former Naperville North QB Matt LaCosse did to the Redhawks one year before.

“It’s not an individual effort,” Randolph said in the aftermath of the 10-point victory, which saw him score three times in the fourth quarter. “Our whole team did a great job (Friday night). The whole offense did a great job. It’s not just an individual effort.”

That performance, while effectively clinching postseason eligibility for the Redhawks, began a five-game stretch that hadn’t been seen around the program since 1999, the year the program won its only state title.

Before losing to Bolingbrook in a Class 8A state semifinal, Naperville Central had rolled off a five-game winning streak, its longest since an eight-game streak in 2006, and one in which its offense averaged 40.6 points per game.

During the five-game winning streak that unexpectedly catapulted the Redhawks into their first state semifinal in 10 years, Randolph contributed two 200-yard rushing efforts and his third five-touchdown game of the season.

Throughout the year, Central coach Mike Stine was effusive in his praise of a senior class that put in the time and hard work to get the program back to where it was in the late 1990s and early 2000s — playing deep into November.

And no one had a bigger impact on that accomplishment than Randolph, who’ll go down in program lore as one of the best running backs to suit up for the program, joining the likes of Jim Tumilty, D.J. Johnson, Ryan Clifford and Kyle Griffith.

“He’s a great football player, but he’s a better person,” Stine said. “He’s one of the leaders of this team. He’s one of the guys that took (2010) to heart a year ago. … Whatever awards Matt gets, it’s due to his hard work. But it’s also due to the whole team.”

And that’s the way Randolph would want it.

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