Naperville North slips past Lake Park in final minute
On a night when Naperville North's high-powered offense was not piling up points, the Huskies still felt good about their chances if they could just stop Lake Park and give their quarterback one more chance to shine Friday night.
Trailing 14-13 in the key DuPage Valley Conference football showdown in Naperville, the Huskies defense was able to force a Lancers punt and get the ball with 2:33 left on the clock, no timeouts and 82 yards away from a possible game-winning touchdown. The way Lake Park's defense was playing, it was a long shot.
But Huskies quarterback Drake Davis had plenty up of his sleeve, including a 56-yard Hail Mary pass to Ryan Laurenzo on third down that moved the ball to the Lancers' 24-yard line with 1:35 left in the game.
From there the senior quarterback let his legs do the work, first gaining 15 yards on a strong run that featured a stiff arm, and then scrambling for a 9-yard touchdown on second-and-goal with 23.1 seconds left for the game-winning points for the unbeaten Huskies.
Davis' 2-point conversion pass to Brett Zdrubecky made the final 21-14 and capped a wild evening that saw him pass for 270 yards and a touchdown and rush for 100 yards and two scores in a 21-14 win that lifts Naperville North to 4-0 overall and 3-0 in the DVC.
"When you got No. 7 on your side you're in good shape," Huskies coach Sean Drendel said of Davis. "We felt like if we could just get one stop somewhere in there that Drake would finally punch one in. He said, 'I got this. And we're going out and we got 80 something yards to go. He goes, 'I got this,' and you've got to smile and you live with it."
Lake Park (2-2, 2-1), which has now suffered back-to-back heartbreaking losses, had led 14-7 after a pair of field goals by Zach Deardorff in the first half and a 12-yard scoring pass from Jackson Behles to Nic Carzoli in the third quarter.
The Huskies answered with a 7-yard touchdown run by Davis but missed the extra point and found themselves trailing by a point. That was before Davis' big toss and Laurenzo's leaping, juggling catch set the stage for the late heroics.
"That there's not a chance in (heck) that I can drop that pass. I just had to catch it," said Laurenzo, when asked about what was going through his mind during the critical play. "It was obviously frustrating, up just 7-6 at the half, but we just trust our coach and we trust our quarterback. He's capable of anything."
Lancers coach Chris Roll and his players were stunned after a second straight last-second setback. Last week they were beaten by a last-second touchdown pass against DeKalb.
Even so, Roll was proud of the way his team played, especially on defense.
"With the way they've been playing we never expected to be able to win 14-13," he said, noting the gaudy point totals the Huskies have compiled this year. "We knew we needed to score again. We need to look at ourselves in the mirror and wake up tomorrow and get better."
Even so, the 2-2 Lancers, who are a couple plays away from being 4-0, showed plenty of heart again.
"We played a really good football game tonight against a really good team. I'm very proud of them," Roll said. "I feel bad for the boys. They've done so much to get us to this point."