St. Charles N. tired of learning the hard way

Seldom does the victory formation turn into a no-win situation.

Unfortunately, that was the case last Friday night for St. Charles North’s football team during its agonizingly painful 26-21 nonconference loss to Plainfield Central.

Despite being outplayed for the better part of three quarters, the North Stars took a 21-20 lead on Collin Peterson’s 2-yard touchdown pass to Oshay Hodges and Michael Schroeder’s PAT kick with 3:19 remaining.

It was a touch of irony for Schroeder, who had suffered a second-quarter knee injury one week earlier and was unable to continue playing during the North Stars’ season-opening 27-26 overtime loss to Hinsdale Central.

Things looked even better for the North Stars after Corbin Bruce intercepted a first-down pass from Plainfield Central quarterback Tim Blake to thwart the Wildcats’ go-ahead hopes with 45.7 seconds left.

It appeared that the North Stars received another break of sorts when officials ruled Bruce’s pick was a touchback because he was in the end zone when he caught the ball that had been tipped by teammate Shawn Collins.

Bruce’s interception return inside the 15-yard line was nullified, seemingly putting the ball out of danger at the 20.

At that point, North Stars players erupted in celebration as they were on the verge of recording their first victory of the season.

“Everybody started to celebrate,” said North Stars coach Mark Gould. “I told them, ‘don’t celebrate yet — it’s not over.’”

He was right.

“We were looking at the clock and we’re right there with 40-something seconds left and (they have) two timeouts,” said Gould.

“We contemplated, ‘do we run (the ball) on first down and are we going to eat up enough time?” the veteran coach added.

Gould elected to go with what is known as the victory formation — where the quarterback lines up behind center surrounded by a pair of running backs. Another player is positioned about 10 yards directly in back of the quarterback just in case of a mishandled snap.

First down: Peterson takes a knee, loss of 2 yards — Plainfield Central calls its second timeout.

Second down: Peterson once again kneels down for a 3-yard loss — Plainfield Central burns its third and final timeout.

Third down: Another Peterson kneel-down, loss of 2 — the clock winds down to 5.2 seconds before the North Stars are whistled for a delay-of-game penalty.

It’s now 4th-and-22 at the North Stars’ 8, and it is again decision-time for Gould.

“We debated having our punter run around for the final 5.2 seconds,” said Gould. “We thought about throwing an incompletion but if you throw it and give them a second on the clock, they’re right back there (at the North Stars’ 8-yard line).”

Gould decided to line up in punt formation — a somewhat dangerous proposition considering the fact that the Wildcats had already blocked a punt inside the North Stars’ 10-yard line to set up their first touchdown.

“We were like, ‘let’s just catch it (the snap) and kick it as fast as we can,” said Gould.

“You know they’re going to bring pressure and I was trying to get rid of it quick,” said Collins, who also serves as the North Stars’ punter. “All I was thinking about was just getting it off and trying to let it roll for five seconds.”

That’s when disaster struck, as 6-2, 290-pound lineman Bryce Douglas bull-rushed through the interior line and got his right hand on the ball.

Moments later, opportunistic teammate Mike Farr pounded on the football a couple yards into the end zone as the final siren sounded.

What was to be an early-season saver turned into a potential season crippler for the North Stars (0-2).

“This will be one that everybody will be evaluating,” said Gould. “There are a lot of ‘what-ifs’ and ‘we should have done this.’

“When you look back, if we had run (a handoff) on first down maybe we would have eaten up those five seconds.”

Don’t be shocked if Gould looks a little more tired at school this week.

“It’s one that I’m sure we’ll be losing sleep over,” Gould said after the hard-to-fathom ending.

In defense of Gould, Collins, and the rest of the North Stars players, they stepped up and answered all of the tough postgame questions asked of them just minutes after experiencing one of the strangest endings imaginable.

I’m sure it wasn’t an easy thing to do — but it was the right thing.

Final question. Where do you go from here?

“You go right back to work,” said Gould. “That’s how you handle adversity in life, you go right back to work. You show up with a lot of energy, you work hard and your goal is the next game.”

Next up for the North Stars is Friday’s road game against Neuqua Valley.

“It’s a big dagger to the team but I think we can rebound,” Collins said of St. Charles North’s back-to-back, final-play defeats. “We’ve got a big game against Neuqua Valley. We can’t get down on ourselves. This isn’t the loss to (St. Charles) East last year (in Week 9). We still have another week. We still have a lot more weeks.”

And hopefully plenty more chances to get back in victory formation.

“You get tired of learning the hard way but sometimes there’s only one way to learn,” said Collins.

You can contact Craig Brueske at csb4k@hotmail.com