Rocks whitewash
Washington
By Marc Nesseler, Sports editor
October 26, 2002
Had it not been for the graciousness of the Chicago Washington football team, the Rock
Island Rocks could have been sitting at home without a game Friday night and heading on
the road next week.
Instead, the Rocks suited up for a 46-0 win over the Minutemen at Almquist Field and
thus will get a home game for the first round of next week's IHSA playoffs.
``Had we not had this game, we essentially would have been considered a 7-2 team (for
playoff seeding purposes) and we very well could have opened up on the road,'' said Rock
Island coach Vic Boblett. Because the Rocks, champs of the Western Big 6, finish the
regular season at 8-1, they'll be among the top seeds for their quadrant when the playoff
pairings are announced tonight.
If an Internet web site that Boblett has been following is correct, the Rocks could
open the playoffs against a familiar foe -- former RI coach Greg King, now the head coach
at Sterling.
``If you go to edgytim.com, they have us meeting up with Sterling (a 36-6 winner over
United Township on Friday) in the first round, and that would be interesting'' the RI
coach said. ``Two weeks ago they had us facing Rockton Hononegah, and last week week it
was Ottawa. It has Galesburg, Freeport, Rockford Boylan and Sterling among the teams in
our 6A quadrant'' of eight teams.
Had not Washington come to the rescue of the Rocks -- the game wasn't added to the RI
schedule until four weeks ago -- it might have been a much different playoff fate.
As far as the Rocks are concerned, the Minutemen are the men of the hour. In fact, the
Minutemen were invited to join the Rocks in their postgame huddle, including the
opportunity for players to speak, underlining the mutual respect of the teams.
``You guys need to know you have a great coach,'' Boblett told the Washington players,
in reference to coach Tom Johnson. ``Now what you need to do is go back to your school and
get more kids out for football. We just had you outnumbered.''
The Rocks dressed 70 players, including plenty of sophomores. In fact, sophomore
Radelle Taylor was the team's leading rusher with 51 yards on three carries. Another soph,
Alex Stickel, had the most carries with seven, good for 42 yards.
Taylor had the last Rocky touchdown, but it was the first-stringers who accounted for
the first five scores. Keenan Wright had the lone first-quarter TD, but he had a hand in a
stretch of 3 TDs in 57 seconds of possession. John Saldana scored one play after a Nick
Fleming fumble recovery. A TD by Calvin Krakilow followed a 32-yard Brandin Smith punt
return to the 1. And on RI's next possession, Wright scored again on a 15-yard run,
following a Brandon Jones fumble recovery.
The RI third string played the third quarter, and the sophomores manned the fourth.
``We anticipated this a bit, so we had a full-fledge 1-on-1 scrimmage Tuesday'' to get
playoff-ready, said Boblett. ``That was very intense.''
-- RI sophs finish with win: If Boblett thought Washington's varsity was
outmanned, it was nothing compared to the Rocks vs. the Washington sophomores. The
Minutemen sophs had just 12 players.
The Rocks built a 33-0 lead through three quarters, getting TDs from Robert Owens,
Zachary Simpson, Stickel, Cody Bower and Tim Beckhart. Despite not reaching the 40-point
mercy rule, the game had a continuous clock for the last half and ended in just one hour
and 20 minutes, at 6:35 p.m.
Copyright 2001, Moline Dispatch
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