No worries about production from Warriors receiver Gray

Updated: August 30, 2011 7:33PM

The prowess of Warriors’ senior wide receiver Demetrius Gray is well known around local prep football circles.

Coming off a junior season that saw him catch 26 balls for 478 yards and record a team-high eight touchdowns, much will be expected of the 6-foot-4 Gray as Waubonsie Valley looks to improve on last year’s 8-3 finish.

In Friday’s 21-7 victory at Naperville Central, Waubonsie’s first over the Redhawks since 2007, with much attention being paid his way, Gray was limited to three receptions for 41 yards.

“They were double covering him and we were doing things. We were using him as a decoy,” Waubonsie Valley coach Paul Murphy said of Gray. “We tried a couple times to get him the ball. (Senior quarterback) Mitch (Stefani) got hit as he threw it or he was a little late (on) a couple of the deep balls. He caught one deep ball, gave us a big first down. Unfortunately, he stepped out of bounds on the other one that he caught and got called back with a penalty.

“Dee’s gonna have his catches. I’m not worried about Dee. What I had to find out is what could I count on from my quarterback? What could I count on from my offensive line? What could we count on from our defense, our special teams? They showed us some good things (Friday).”

Included in that group was Stefani, who completed 12-of-16 passes for 189 yards and a pair of long touchdown passes to junior tight end Troy Fumagalli.

Stefani is also not concerned with the production Gray will provide this year.

“He still had a nice game,” Stefani said. “I was trying to make the smart decisions instead of being picky and go with him every time because, obviously, the defense knows he’s got a lot of talent. But he’ll be back. (One catch) doesn’t mean anything. Next week’s gonna be the same routine as last week in practice. We’re still gonna look for him a lot. It’s just one week.”

Central looking for production through air

Not much went right in Naperville Central’s 21-7 loss at home to Waubonsie Valley Friday.

Several factors can be pinpointed as to why, but three first-half turnovers put the Redhawks behind the 8-ball early. Not helping was the inability of senior quarterback Ian Lewandowski to produce with his arm rather than his legs.

Lewandowski completed only 3-of-10 passes for 72 yards and was picked off twice. His first completion, a 10-yard pass to Lesoda Thompson, came with 9:36 left in the third quarter.

His 55-yard TD pass to junior wide receiver and St. Ignatius import Blake Butler with 2:26 left in regulation prevented a shutout, but a lot of work remains heading into Friday’s meeting with Neuqua Valley.

A three-sport athlete, Lewandowski’s athleticism is one of the strengths for a Naperville Central offense that will rely heavily on senior running back Matt Randolph, an all-DuPage Valley Conference first team pick.

But for the Redhawks to truly have success in 2011, they know they’ll need to be able to be balanced instead of asking Randolph, who had 129 yards on 27 carries against the Warriors, to carry the majority of the load.

“No, it can’t (be all Randolph and Lewandowski on the ground),” Naperville Central coach Mike Stine said. “You gotta throw it, so we got to get better at that. We will. I know Waubonsie was an 8-3 team last year. I’m hoping they’re another really good team, which I think they are. They were a little more athletic. They were pretty big, pretty fast, pretty athletic up there. Their defensive line was very good. But I thought we even could push them around a little bit, but we couldn’t.”

IHSA rules Benet QB Weller eligible

In the midst of preparing his team last week for their season opener at Nazareth, which turned out to be a 17-0 loss, Benet coach Pat New expressed some frustration with how long it was taking the IHSA to rule on quarterback Kevin Weller’s eligibility.

Wanting to make sure Weller, a junior transfer from Neuqua Valley, would be eligible, New requested that the IHSA give the school approval.

“I went to our athletic director (Gary Goforth) and I said that I want written confirmation from the IHSA stating that he’s eligible,” New said last week. “Benet is very serious about following the rules and being on the up-and-up. I wanted to make sure that we’re staying within the rules. I just wanted to be very up front with the IHSA and say this is our situation, please give us a ruling on it.”

New was seeking to avoid a similar situation that East St. Louis faced a year ago when it was learned prior to the start of the postseason that it had used an ineligible player.

As a result, the Flyers, a No. 1 seed in Class 7A, were ruled ineligible for the postseason by the IHSA and had to forfeit all their wins from 2009 and 2010.

Weller and Benet received clearance Friday and Weller went 8-of-15 passing for 69 yards and two interceptions in the loss at Nazareth Saturday.

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