Football: Naperville Central cruises past Belleville East

Updated: November 8, 2011 10:33AM

Naperville Central brought some sanity to the IHSA Class 8A state playoff’s wildest bracket Friday against visiting Belleville East.

The highest surviving seed in its quadrant after the Nos. 1, 4 and 5 seeds went down last weekend, No. 9 Naperville Central (8-3) had little trouble with 16th-seeded Belleville East, advancing to next weekend’s quarterfinals with a 43-3 victory.

Naperville Central quarterback Ian Lewandowski (7 of 11, 128 yards) ran for two touchdowns and threw for another as the Redhawks scored on four of their first five possessions.

“Coach (J.R.) Rexilius works with me every day,” Lewandowski said. “I have to give him all the credit. He never gets down on me. He encourages me. And I have the support of all my teammates. I know if we do our job as an offense, the defense is going to do its job.”

Naperville Central running back Matt Randolph (16 carries, 197 yards) scored on runs of two and 76 yards as the Redhawks broke the 40-point barrier for the second straight playoff game.

“Ian has been doing a nice job pulling the trigger and No. 20 is a pretty special kid,” Naperville Central coach Mike Stine said. “After we missed the playoffs last year, these seniors said it would never happen again.”

Lewandowski’s 44-yard toss to Clayton Scott with 12 seconds remaining in the second quarter set up the senior quarterback’s own six-yard touchdown run that extended the lead to 33-3 at the break.

Third-quarter interceptions by Naperville Central defenders Pat Clark and John Dullock set up Tyler Gillen’s 22-yard field goal and Randolph’s 76-yard touchdown run.

“Our defense is a very physical group,” Stine said. “If you play 48 minutes against that defense, you’re going to be sore the next day. It starts with our guys up front and our coaching staff does a great job preparing them.”

Belleville East (6-5), which drove 65 yards on its first possession to tie the score at 3-3 on Austin Bartle’s 23-yard field goal, also lost two fumbles. The Lancers’ first fumble, at their own 31-yard line with 2:52 remaining in the first half, set up a 31-yard touchdown pass from Lewandowski to John Dicianni.

“We just didn’t play well, and to play our style, we can’t turn the ball over and make mistakes,” Belleville East coach Tim Funk said. “At the same time, we got beat by a better football team. They played well and we didn’t.”

© 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.