No. 7 Waubonsie Valley (4-0, 2-0 Upstate Eight Valley) @ Glenbard East (3-1, 1-1 Upstate Eight Valley), 7:30PM Friday, Sept 26.
Last week: Waubonsie Valley won at Bartlett, 49-7; Glenbard East won at East Aurora, 56-6
Storyline: Amidst going through the program’s second 4-0 start in the last three years, Waubonsie Valley is rolling along as it prepares for Friday’s trip to Lombard and the program’s first-ever meeting with Glenbard East.
Senior quarterback Zack Bennema ran for 107 yards and three touchdowns as four different Warriors accounted for their six rushing touchdowns en route to piling up 354 total yards offensively in their 49-7 win at Bartlett last week.
Bennema, who also threw a touchdown pass to Keaton Casey for second straight week, and senior running back Tony Durns have combined to run for 919 yards and 12 TDs through Waubonsie Valley’s first four games as its offense has averaged 36.3 points per game.
Not to be outdone, the Warriors’ defense has permitted three of their four opponents to single digits, including opening up the year by limiting defending Class 8A state champion Naperville Central to six points.
Making its Upstate Eight Valley debut this season, Glenbard East rebounded quite nicely from a 20-point loss to Neuqua Valley the week before with a rout of East Aurora last week.
Dominic Wilberton had a pair of TD runs in the Rams’ 28-point second quarter against the Tomcats as the Rams put up 56 points en route to picking up their third win of the season, surpassing their 2013 win total of two in the process.
Aside from allowing 20 second-half points to Neuqua Valley to break a 6-6 halftime tie in an eventual 26-6 loss on Sept. 12, the Glenbard East defense has permitted its three other opponents to a combined 27 points.
But given the way Bennema, Durns and company are rolling on offense, the Rams’ most stiffest test to date on defense may very well await.
Waubonsie Valley coach Paul Murphy on Glenbard East: “They’re playing super aggressive on defense. They’re doing a lot of blitzing, so we’re going to have to find out if they want to blitz the option or if they want to play assignment football on the option.
“Obviously, they’re going to try to create a lot of big plays with all their blitzes, kind of like the New York Jets (Monday) night against the Bears. So we’re going to have to be ready for the blitzing and execute our offense and see if that happens.
“They remind me a lot of us. They got really quick skill kids on offense that can make big plays and they throw the ball about 50 percent of the time. They run the ball about 50 percent of the time. They’re an attacking style of defense, so I think they remind us of ourselves.”
