By: After going down eight points in the third quarter, Illinois College scored 19 unanswered to put away the Scots.
Box Score
JACKSONVILLE, Ill. – The Illinois College football team overcame a number of miscues and dug out of an eight-point second half deficit to defeat Macalester College, 32-27, on Saturday afternoon at England Stadium in the season finale.
It was an error-filled game for both teams, starting for the Blueboys on the second play from scrimmage. A pass from
Drew Chance to
Logan Uyetake went for 21 yards before the ball was jarred loose and recovered by Macalester. The Illinois College defense was up to the task early on though, forcing a three-and-out from the Scots.
Later in the opening quarter, Macalester would shoot itself in the foot by losing 22 yards on a bad snap and missing out on a scoring opportunity by forcing itself out of field goal range. A good punt pinned the Blueboys back to their own 5-yard line, but the Blueboys went 95 yards in seven plays, the big play a 38-yard completion to
Mason Farris to put IC in the red zone.
Greg Cross took the ball in from four yards out to put Illinois College on top, 7-0. The final two drives of the first quarter ended in interceptions, the first by IC's
Steve Reyna, followed by a Chance Carnahan pick in the end zone to deny the Blueboys a chance to stretch their lead.
Early on in the second quarter, the Scots pressured an Illinois College punt attempt and ended up taking possession on the Blueboy 27-yard line. After a pass interference call, it took just one play for Christian Adams to find Jonathan Knee for a 16-yard score to knot the game at 7-7. The next two Illinois College drives ended with a fumble and an interception, the latter giving the ball to Macalester on the IC 45. The Scots dink and dunked the ball down the field, ending the 11-play drive with a one-yard touchdown run by Matt Bonazzoli to make it 14-7.
Taking over with less than 75 seconds until the half, Illinois College pushed downfield, thanks mainly to a 39-yard catch and run by
Glen Gibbons Jr. On a third down from the Macalester red zone,
Kyle Obertino hauled in a 17-yard touchdown pass from Chance, and though the extra point was missed, the Blueboys went to the half down just a point at 14-13.
On the opening drive of the second half, Macalester marched 79 yards in 10 plays, capped by a 20-yard touchdown pass from Adams to Knee to take a 21-13 lead. The Scots then used some trickery, recovering a surprise on-side kick and starting a drive near midfield. With the game beginning to tilt towards the visitors,
Michael Garcia made a huge play by intercepting Adams on the first play of the new drive to give IC possession. Obertino brought in a 29-yard completion from Chance and
Shak Johnson eventually pushed the ball over the goal line from one yard out. The two-point conversion attempt failed, but the Blueboys were back in it at 21-19.
Illinois College had the ball back with less than 12 minutes remaining in the contest. After a run by Cross gave the Blueboys a fresh set of downs, IC went for the home run ball. The result was a 65-yard touchdown pass from Chance to Gibbons Jr. Again the two-point conversion was unsuccessful, but Illinois College had the lead, 25-21, for the first time since early in the game.
After the defense forced the Macalester offense off the field in three plays, the Illinois College offense got back to work. Taking over with less than 10 minutes to play, the Blueboys moved 68 yards in eight plays, with Obertino cashing in the Chance touchdown pass from four yards out to increase the advantage to 32-21 with 6:43 remaining.
In must-score mode, Macalester was able to target Jack Streibich to help unlock the stingy IC defense. On a 15-play drive, Adams targeted Streibich seven times with five completions. On a first-and-goal, Adams connected with Alec Beatty for a five-yard score to make it 32-27. The two-point conversion attempt was no good.
With just over three minutes on the clock and one timeout remaining, Macalester's best chance was to try another on-side kick, but
Vincent Vanhorne was in the right place at the right time to make the recovery. On a third down, Chance completed a pass to Obertino to get the first down Illinois College needed and the Blueboys ran out the clock from there.
Chance ended the day 27-of-35 for 372 yards with three touchdown passes and two interceptions. Gibbons Jr. led the Blueboys in receiving yards with six catches for 131 yards, while Obertino had a team-high 11 receptions for 114 yards.
Logan Uyetake added six catches for 69 yards. On the ground, Cross had 15 carries for 51 yards, with Chance adding eight carries for 39 yards.
Ryan Torrance was everywhere for the Blueboy defense in his final game, ending with 16 tackles (eight solo), including two for a loss of eight yards.
Mike Koos added eight tackles (three solo) and Vanhorne had seven (three solo). Reyna had an interception and was involved in four other pass break-ups.
The win was the first for the Blueboys in three meetings with the Scots and gives IC a 5-5 record for the year, marking the ninth year in a row that the team ends with at least a .500 winning percentage.
