By: In his first career start, senior quarterback Brady Huber threw for five TDs and ran for another in a 53-20 rout over Aurora University.
Box Score AURORA, Ill. – Once the Illinois College offense gets rolling, it's tough to get it stopped. Looks like that trend should continue in 2015. The Blueboys took a commanding 29-0 lead into halftime and cruised from that point on, defeating Aurora University by a score of 53-20 at AU's Vago Field on Saturday afternoon.
In his first career start at quarterback,
Brady Huber was beyond impressive. The senior ended the game 26-of-40 for 349 yards and five touchdown passes, plus another 41 yards and a touchdown on the ground. He picked out eight targets through the air, with
Austin Ellsworth and
Kyle Obertino each hauling in a pair of touchdowns.
Andy Webb had the other for IC.
Though Illinois College went three-and-out on its opening drive, the Blueboys were gifted a safety after punting the ball back to the Spartans. A fumble on the snap was recovered by Aurora in its own end zone to give IC a 2-0 lead less than four minutes into the game.
The Blueboys got things rolling on its next chance with the football. Starting on their own 34, the team used three straight running plays to move past midfield, then Huber hit Ellsworth for a 23-yard gain to move the chains again. Consecutive connections with
Logan Uyetake and Ellsworth got IC a first-and-goal and Huber hit Obertino two plays later on a 12-yard strike. The Uyetake extra point made it 9-0.
Late in the first quarter, Aurora had moved the chains with a 12-yard run, but then started moving backwards due to penalties. Facing a 3rd-and-19, Kendall Lawson threw downfield but was intercepted by IC's
Jacob Homann. Homann returned the ball 31 yards to the AU 19-yard line and Huber found Webb in the end zone on IC's first play with the ball, giving the Blueboys a 16-0 lead after one quarter of play.
It would get worse for Aurora late in the second quarter. Huber ran for 10 yards on a fourth down in Spartan territory to keep a drive going and then completed a 20-yard pass to Obertino for another score to increase the IC edge to 22-0 with just over two minutes remaining until the half. Following another brief AU possession,
Carlos Lemus hauled in a 40-yard pass from Huber on the first play of a new drive to move the ball from the IC 30 to the Aurora 30. Three straight incompletions followed, but Ellsworth picked up 14 yards on 4th-and-10 to move the chains. It was then Ellsworth who put the exclamation point on the first half, catching an eight-yard pass from Huber with less than 30 seconds remaining to make it 29-0 at the break.
Aurora showed a flicker of life in the third quarter, scoring on its second possession to make it 29-7 contest. With the ball at their own 25 following a touchback on the kickoff, the Blueboys continued to eat up yardage in chunks against the Spartans. A 20-yard catch from
Brendan Finley got the ball into Spartan territory at the 35 and two receptions from Ellsworth did the rest, restoring the 29-point cushion at 36-7. Later in the third quarter, Uyetake tacked on a 30-yard field goal to make it 39-7 entering the fourth.
The Spartans started off the fourth quarter by getting a touchdown back and two stalled drives from the Blueboys followed. An interception from
Michael Hightower again gave Illinois College some momentum though, setting up the Blueboys with the ball inside the Aurora 10. On the first play of the drive, Huber gashed the AU defense for nine yards and the score, with Uyetake adding the extra point to make it 46-13.
Aurora had one last touchdown drive in it, scoring with less than two minutes remaining to make the score 46-20. But on a day when Illinois College had all the answers, it was fitting that the Spartans didn't have too much time to enjoy the late score. On the ensuing kickoff,
Greg Cross took the ball from the IC 9-yard line and burst 91 yards for the kick return touchdown, putting the final points on the board in the 53-20 victory.
Ellsworth ended the game with eight catches for 103 yards and two TDs. Obertino grabbed six passes for 102 yards and two scores. On the ground, it took
Dyllan Bailey only eight carries to rack up 73 yards, while Huber had his 41 yards on nine attempts.
Defensively,
Dylan Schuler led the Blueboys with 8.5 tackles (eight solo), including one sack and two tackles for a loss.
Matt Graef added six tackles (four solo) and
Josh Brooks had five.
Adam Jackson and
Meeko Reddick added one sack each. In addition to his interception, Hightower had a pair of pass breakups for IC.
Next week brings Illinois College home to England Stadium for its first home game of 2015. Like last season, the Blueboys will play their opener under the lights, kicking off with Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology at 6 p.m. on Sept. 12. Last season at RHIT, the Fightin' Engineers and Blueboys played an instant classic that went three overtimes and ended with RHIT winning a 74-68 decision that tied the NCAA Division III record for most combined points in a single game.
