North Shore holds on to grab playoff win

Updated: October 29, 2011 7:26PM

North Shore Country Day took a big first-half lead and then was forced to hold on at the end in a 28-24 win over Flanagan-Cornell/Woodland in a Class 1A playoff opener on Saturday in Winnetka.

The No. 6-seeded Raiders (9-1) led 28-8 at halftime, but committed some costly second-half turnovers that helped the No. 11-seeded Falcons (6-4) get back into the contest.

The North Shore defense did come up with a handful of big stops on Flanagan’s last drive.

“(Flanagan) didn’t roll over and die. That’s a heckuva team. Those guys stayed in there and battled,” said North Shore coach Jim Deuble, who won his 100th game at the school. “If we don’t get a couple of those early scores, we have our hands full.”

The coach continued: “(Flanagan) adjusted. I don’t know if we kept looking at the scoreboard and kept thinking we could slow down a little bit. We still have to learn to finish. On defense, we kind of bent, but didn’t break.”

The Raiders, who won the school’s first playoff game since 1999, did much of their damage through the air. Senior quarterback Steve Smith threw three touchdown passes.

Smith hit junior receiver Austin Curran for a 31-yard score in the first quarter, threw a seven-yarder to the same receiver in the second and also found senior Zach March for a 29-yard touchdown late in the second quarter.

Raiders junior tailback Ayo Okesanya added a one-yard run in the first half.

The visitors from north of Bloomington got on the scoreboard in the second quarter when senior Robert Gilliam scored on a 20-yard pass, which cut the Raider lead to 21-8.

In the second half, Flanagan junior quarterback Alex Dutko scored on a one-yard run, and later junior Nate Roemer recovered a fumble in the end zone as the Falcons. Flanagan converted all three of its two-point conversions in the contest.

North Shore attempted and recovered two onside kicks in the game and junior Kendrick Hales recovered a fumble.

North Shore next will face No. 3 Forreston (9-1), which beat No. 14 Hales 31-28 on Saturday.F

© 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.