1,820 days of heartbreak end: Joliet Central snaps five-year losing streak

PLAINFIELD – 1,820 days. That’s how long the Joliet Central football team went without a win. A week shy of five years to the day since the Steelmen beat Plainfield Central on October 18, 2019, 40 games in which their closest contest was a 17-point loss.

It was a streak of futility that covered two presidencies and started before the COVID-19 pandemic.

There had been a lot of tears over the past five seasons since then, and there were more Friday night. First-year athletic director Kevin Fitzgerald fought back tears alongside coach Tom Hart. Parents, player and fans saw teardrops fall upon the turf at Plainfield Central long after the game was over.

This time, however, they weren’t the tears of futility, devastation or defeat. For the first time in 260 weeks, they were the sweet tears of victory.

The Joliet Central Steelmen were victors Friday night by a score of 37-17 over the Plainfield Central Wildcats. The senior class was a group of middle schoolers the last time the program tasted victory.

This season’s Steelmen surrendered 70-plus points in back-to-back weeks, were shut out for the first time in two years and suffered through a litany of injuries. As the Joliet Central community celebrated Friday night, all of that seemed like a distant memory.

“These seniors were my first class of freshmen,” Hart said following his first victory as head coach. “They’ve been with me since Day 1. We’ve been chipping away and, yeah, we wanted to quit [sometimes], especially this season, giving up back-to-back 70-point games, and we just kept going. I’m so proud of these kids for just going out and playing football and enjoying each other.”

The game started with a bang as Plainfield Central’s Muayyad Masri blocked a Joliet Central punt on the opening possession to give the Wildcats the ball on the Steelemen 25-yard line. Despite the excellent start, Plainfield Central wound up settling for a 32-yard field goal by Marshall DeGraff.

The Steelmen wouldn’t allow this night to go as so many others had gone over the years. Quarterback Paul Slick hit Dimarius Matthews for a 50-yard completion on the next Joliet Central possession to put them deep in Wildcats territory. A few plays later, Christian Smith punched it in from the 1-yard line to put the Steelmen in front 7-3 with 3:33 left in the opening period.

The Steelmen later took over at the Wildcats’ 32 and made it 4 yards before they opted to go for it on fourth and six. Slick handed off to Jonas Gregory who was swarmed in the backfield only for the senior to then throw the ball deep to a wide-open Matthews for a 28-yard score. The Steelmen found themselves up 14-3 only 11 seconds into the second quarter.

Joliet Central found the end zone again on a 4-yard scoring run by Smith to make it 21-3.

The Wildcats would not go quietly into the night, however. They used a long, methodical drive of their own to close out the half as Javar Jones punched it in from the 3 to shave the deficit to 21-10.

Smith hit pay dirt for the third time on a 34-yard touchdown run early in the second half, during which he made half the defense miss. The Wildcats wouldn’t surrender as a 37-yard run by Tyler Major set up a 13-yard touchdown by Torrance Freeman to make it 28-17 in favor of the Steelmen.

The Steelmen were forced to punt their next possession, but the ball was muffed by the Wildcats and recovered by Xavier Eggert to set Joliet Central up at the Plainfield Central 10. The Steelmen settled for a field goal by Gregory to make it 31-17 with three minutes left in the third.

Plainfield Central continued to fight, but couldn’t put anymore points on the board, and Slick’s late 4-yard touchdown run locked things up with less than two minutes to go.

Joliet Central is now 1-6 overall.