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Bartlett scores early, often over South Elgin
Updated: October 1, 2011 8:38PM
With one big scoring barrage, Bartlett completely knocked the life out of rival South Elgin on Saturday.
The Hawks piled up 35 unanswered points in the second and third quarters, highlighted by a burst of three touchdowns in just over four minutes as they cruised to a 45-10 victory against the host Storm.
Senior quarterback A.J. Bilyeu played a leading role in the rout, completing 9-of-13 passes for 201 yards and three touchdowns. The outcome keeps Bartlett (4-2, 3-0) in a tie for first in the Upstate Eight Valley and simultaneously deals a serious blow to the playoff hopes of South Elgin (2-4, 2-2), which slips to 1-3 all-time against the Hawks.
“We expected to have an awesome game and the scoreboard shows it,” Bilyeu said. “We weren’t going to let up, especially on their home field. They’ve got a nice new field and we’ve got to share ours with Streamwood, so this was personal.”
All signs pointed to a nip-and-tuck affair when David Reisner booted a 22-yard field goal to pull the Storm within 10-3 with 7:13 left in the second quarter, but Bartlett answered five plays later when Bilyeu hooked up with senior Zach Karys for a 6-yard touchdown pass.
The teams traded punts on the next two possessions, but the Hawks landed a major blow right before halftime when Karys faked a slant and sprinted to the corner of the end zone for a 27-yard touchdown catch from Bilyeu to put Bartlett ahead 24-3 going into the break.
Any chance of a Storm comeback was snuffed out right away in the third quarter as Aaron Everson ran back the opening kickoff of the second half 96 yards for a touchdown. South Elgin quarterback Zach Gross was then picked off by Nick Garcia on the next play from scrimmage, and two plays later Bilyeu lobbed a 28-yard touchdown pass to a wide open Lorenzo Williams to make the score 38-3.
A 4-yard touchdown run by sophomore James Butler with 4:25 left in the third quarter made the score 45-3 as the Hawks enjoyed a running clock during the fourth quarter for the second straight week.
“We needed to come out and keep stepping on their throats,” said Karys, who finished with six catches for 97 yards.
South Elgin got a 75-yard touchdown run from Gross in the third quarter, but other than that it was unable to do much against Bartlett’s defense as senior standout Adolfo Pacheco was held to 15 rushing yards on 11 carries.
A big reason for the Storm’s offensive woes was the absence of right tackle Jon Slania. He joined senior left tackle Christian Guerrero on the sidelines with an injury, leaving South Elgin without both of its returning All-UEC Valley linemen after Guerrero suffered a knee injury in the season opener.
In addition to having a running game stuck in neutral, the Storm also committed four turnovers and failed to recover a short kickoff on what was a forgettable afternoon.
“We’ve played pretty well all year long, but I guess we just picked one day to have about everything go wrong,” South Elgin coach Dale Schabert said. “Losing (Slania) made a huge difference, and hopefully we’ll get him back next week.”
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