Hilltoppers 20 St. Rita 7 @ Halftime
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Big W for JC - ship appears to be righting
JC has a big line, good RBs, ran all game, attempted 1 pass play all game (that was incomplete). The rain & wind made it so each team could only move the ball, kickoff, punt, etc.. when with the wind for both teams. Rita looked out of sync most of the game, dropped passes, trouble getting plays off, played pretty bad on both sides of the ball.
Huge win for the Hillmen!! Better team won tonight. JC was more physical and wore them down.
Jc and Montini - I likem both if they can get into the 5A dance with those tough Conference schedules in the ESCC and the Blue.
Look at all the love for JCA now. Lol. I called it. Lost their all conference center at half time. Still kicked their butt. I called it for the last two weeks. Feels good. Go Hill!!!!!
Road ahead is still treacherous. Had to win one of first two. Good thing we got this one because IC sounds like a bear. If we lose to IC next week, it's still an uphill battle to 5 wins. Hope all the injuries were not severe and those kids are all back at it next week. Because just a few of those can take this train right off the track.
I said that from day 1, injuries will kill this team. Only thing that will stop JCA. But only one person besides me called the victory tonite. I will just savor this moment. This team is hardened. They don’t need to learn how to win. I hate when people say that. Most of these kids are three year starters. Rita lost their good linemen. This game was easy call but because of two bad years, people forget about these group of seniors. They have talent. I’m not saying they will beat Marist, Naz or Nd, but I think they will make the playoffs. They are not world beaters like jca’s Glory years, but this team has some talent that is overshadowed by two losing seasons. I bet JCA will be the most talked about team this week and should be. Let them enjoy this time. Lol
Because you asked:
- South to North wind and misting rain in 1st Half factored into field position and what each team could do
- With wind at their back, Rita kicked off into end zone
- In full Double Wing Hilltoppers pick up 2 1st downs and get a delay penalty on 4 & 2 and then punt into wind ...... High punt nets 7 yards
- Rita executes their read option spread like a machine for 7 or so plays and scores + PAT
- Kickoff goes into end zone
- Hilltoppers continue Double Wing methodically move to midfield and loose acclaimed Junior RB to leg injury ..... Change to Wing-T and start pounding various between the tackles plays with some off-tackle plays and score but miss PAT
- Rita has wind in their face Q2 & Q3 plus Hilltoppers defense adjusts
- Hilltoppers start controlling LOS and Rita's 9 in the box slow Hilltoppers O, but earlier gains of 4-5 yards are becoming 7-8 yards with a few break always
- Hilltoppers lost the Center and the impact was noticeable early, but the young guy who subbed stepped up and they began to roll again
- Rita found some life halfway through Q4 and still had a glimmer of hope by scoring in Q4 taking it to 23-13, then failed on 2 pt conversion
- Hilltopper FB breaks through the middle for 50 yard or so TD
- Rita rolls like in opening drive, scores TD and PAT to make it 30-20
- Rita gets perfect hop and great execution of onside kick
- Two incompletions, a sack and on 4th down over throws deep receiver
- Hilltoppers grind, pick up 1st down and run out the clock
Rita has an explosive and quick Offense with small shifty skill guys who hide well in the crowds and move well in the open field. Defensively, I do not know how often they will go with the 4-4, 4-5 alignment from this week, but they were hitting a hard and trying to strip the ball like Peanut Tilman.
#55 is a two-way lineman that Rita lost midway through the 2nd Half. Hopes that he recovers as he played like a man.
IMO, the Hilltoppers won at the LOS and like speed, their size and strength cannot be simulated in practice. They have brushing runners with breakaway speed so pound, pound, pound and pop wears an opponent down and big &'strong on D-Line, aggresive LBs plus exceptional speed in the secondary. Too much of that is what won the game for the Hiiltoppers.
Lastly, I believe in looking at match ups when assessing how a team will fair against future opponents. I do not think Rita will encounter a team that is built like and executes they way the Hilltoppers do. Others will do other things well, so I would not use this game as a barometer.
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Good synopsis penlight. But Rita got manhandled form jump street. Size does matter and being seasoned like these guys are says a lot. Rita got out played on both sides of the ball. The offense was getting 3-4 yards from the very first snap of the game. JCA always wears down opponents. That’s what the wing does. If it doesn’t, JCA loses. JCA defense is a rubber band defense. If it gets a couple stops a game, they win. But they stepped up last night. Kudos to them. There’s no surprises there. If Rita didn’t know that, big mistake. I was glad to read for the last month or so, how Rita was going to win by 14 points or better. Only mccaravan and myself predicted upset as I recall. Forgive me if there was someone else. Maybe Rita was believing in all hype of the point spread against JCA. To say there’s no other team Rita faces with big strong linemen like JCA is hard to believe. I came from a city catholic school, so I know, they will. I think they got beat from the stand point that the offense JCA runs was too much to learn or understand because they don’t face anyone who runs that in the state. That’s a true statement. But they did have all summer to prepare. So in my opinion, I know I will get jumped for this, St. Rita is not as good as most of you guys think. It has to be that way because their the people who say JCA isn’t good or proven. Well the fact is the lesser team beat the better team. JCA not only won the battles but won the war. Definitely was the game to go too in week 1 and definitely the upset of the week. Not taking anything away from Brother Rice, they got beat up on too, Kudos to them. I know it’s a long season and upsets happen. But I think this JCA team played with heart and two losing seasons really made these guys focused. Heart is something you can’t measure. 5 wins is attainable now and the so called experts said they need to win 1 out of the first 2 to make the playoffs. Well, it happened. The win wasn’t a fluke or lucky. It was hard earned. The ship didn’t right it self after this win. The ship righted itself by these boys putting in hard work and effort in the off season. Next up, IC catholic. I will sit back and hope I hear more banter on how JCA needs how to learn to win and they haven’t proved anything yet. Go ahead and preach how wrong this is like you preached JCA didn’t have a chance against Rita. I will believe you. Maybe they don’t win a championship this year, maybe they do. I will sit back and watch 3 year varsity starters have their day in the sun. Lord knows the sun didn’t shine the last two years. Go get’em Hill! You guys deserve it for all the perseverance the last two years. I love a good underdog story. Go Hill!!!!
We get it - you excited and that was a huge win for JCA last night. Congrats! I said in another thread (and also earlier this summer in the 5A thread) that I like JCA and Montini to make good runs if they both can survive their tough conferences and get into the 5A dance!
That said just a couple other unsolicited comments:
1 good post - but a paragraph or two makes it easier on the eyes to read and absorb your great post!
2. See Bones’ post above - it is only week one,... a long season still ahead. Hopefully the glory isn’t baking and tanning too long as game two is approaching in 6 days!
Point taken voodoo. Will try to keep it shorter. The kids on this team won’t bask in the glory past Sunday. They know what they have ahead of them in IC catholic. The coaches have been preaching take it one game at a time. They will be ready. The last two years were humbling for them as starters. Go Hill!!!
Doesn’t have to be shorter!! I enjoyed reading the post!! I just Love paragraphs for the longer posts to break up the post into more digestible chunks so I can absorb it better (I get lost sometimes on where I am with my bad eyes with the super long posts with no “breaks” - (maybe I should have been an English teacher!).
Good luck to JCA next week! Looking forward to the post game report!
My takeaways from the varsity game....
Iannantone is straight from a Joe Benson or JR mold. Big and fast combo. Hailey is small and powerful. Kinda looks like Mike ivlow in 2013.
Hope the other RB Williams is ok. They need him healthy and need him to hit holes with less hesitation. Big play threat. I would consider using at wideout or end.
Secondary was very strong. Every route had someone near it. Even when a pass was completed, it was a tight window and the receiver was tackled immediately.
O line will be good. Stay healthy.
Have to develop a passing game and I'm not sure if the personnel is there for it. That's why I say Williams may be best suited at te/wr to help them become multi dimensional. I know the weather was poor, but the one attempt I saw wasn't a great effort by anyone on the offense.
We still know very little about this team. Could win a state championship and could miss the playoffs. A win next week would be huge for playoff hopes. A state championship will require full health and substantial improvement in the passing game.
The game article from the newspaper formerly known as The Joliet Herald News.
http://www.theherald-news.com/2018/08/25/prep-football-joliet-catholic-grinds-out-a-victory/a722flx/
http://www.theherald-news.com/2018/08/25/prep-football-joliet-catholic-grinds-out-a-victory/a722flx/
