Meadows keeps rolling up the points

A quick start on both sides of the ball led Rolling Meadows to a big win Friday night over visiting Elk Grove.

The Mustangs, excelling both offensively and defensively in the first 12 minutes, stunned the Grens with 35 first quarter points en route to a 42-20 Mid-Suburban East win at Robert A. Hoese Field.

"We came out tonight to work our hardest, do what we could do, and play the game the way we know how to play it," said Rolling Meadows junior Jose Aleman, who had 3 of 6 his team's first-half sacks.

The Rolling Meadows first period point parade began with a 34-yard touchdown run from senior running back Tim Szylak.

Then junior Nife Oseni recovered a botched Elk Grove punt snap in the end zone for a score. On the next Grens punt attempt, Meadows blocked it and Jace O'Hara pounced on the ball in the end zone for another TD.

O'Hara scored again on a 2-yard plunge from his running back position, then Charlie Svoboda ended the touchdown barrage with a 39-yard scoring pass from quarterback Arek Kleniuk.

Meadows ended the first 12 minutes with a 5-TD lead despite running only 12 offensive plays in the quarter.

"I'm glad our defense was able to put up some points," said Oseni, "and do what we needed to do to get the win."

The Grens played much better in the second stanza, with Matt Crimmins stepping up with some big plays from his linebacker position.

But Meadows was able to go on a long drive near the end of the half and took a 42-0 lead at intermission when O'Hara scored again from 2 yards out.

Elk Grove (0-5, 0-1) rebounded to post 3 second half touchdowns, 2 coming from sophomore running back Ian Ridge, who tallied rushing scores of 8 and 39 yards.

Crimmins - from his wide receiver spot - had the game's final TD on a 9-yard pass from quarterback Charles Janczak.

Ridge finished with 71 rushing yards on 11 carries.

For Meadows (5-0, 1-0), Szylak had 81 yards on the ground.

"I feel like tonight it was all (about) our coaches game plan," said Kleniuk. "We executed it, we reviewed everything in practice, and just came out and played."

"I've never seen a quarter before where we've been up by 35 points with only two offensive possessions," added Kleniuk. "But we don't really look at the score. We look at next play, next play, next play. That's what our coaches emphasize."