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Naperville Central pounds its way past Metea Valley

At every level from high school on up, football has become an increasingly pass-happy game, but sometimes ultimate success can be found in going back to the basics.

Trailing visiting Metea Valley 7-6 at halftime on Friday night, Naperville Central decided a return to the days of yesteryear would be the best way to flip the score and unleashed an old-school, up-the-gut power running game that helped account for 3 second-half touchdowns in a 27-7 DuPage Valley Conference victory.

"In the first half, we got away from what we do best, the power run," said Redhawks center Cooper Ludovice, who teamed with guards Alec Bugaj and Trevor Campbell to pave the way for 142 second-half rushing yards. "We stuck to our roots in the second half and just pounded it at them. We were getting on each other in the first half, but the coaches sat us down at halftime and just told us to calm down and concentrate on what we needed to do."

The main beneficiaries for the Redhawks (3-0, 3-0) were running backs Luke Brady and Jeremiah Wiggins, who had scoring runs of 36 and 1 yard, respectively, to cap Central's first two second-half possessions and create a 20-7 lead.

"We talked at halftime and we challenged the seniors, we challenged the guys up front and they came out and executed in the second half," said Central coach Mike Stine. "We just tried to do what we do best. We know that to be a good football team we need to run the ball and stop the run."

The biggest stop for the Redhawks came on Metea's first possession of the second half. Facing a fourth-and-5 from the Central 46, coach Ben Kleinhans decided to go for it, but Alonzo Taylor was stuffed for no gain, setting the stage for Brady's score 4 plays later.

"We really wanted to take the momentum there and we had an opportunity," explained Kleinhans. "You can always second guess about it, but we wanted to be aggressive early in the third quarter. Unfortunately, we didn't make it, we gave them a short field and they went down and scored right away."

Until then, the Mustangs (1-2, 1-2) had been very self-assured on offense, with Taylor and Maurice Burkley consistently finding running lanes and quarterback Conner Lovely making pinpoint throws to a bevy of receivers.

After Central took a 3-0 first-quarter lead on Connor Assalley's 27-yard field goal, the Mustangs drove to the Central 11, but came up empty after a missed field goal. On their next possession, though, the Mustangs broke through with Lovely capping a 50-yard drive with a 5-yard run. The Redhawks did pull within one at the half courtesy of Assalley's 32-yard field goal with 7 seconds left. Central closed the scoring on Conor Joyce's 31-yard pass to Jordan Crissy with 7 minutes to play.

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