Wilmington plays keep-away to hold off Coal City 21-14 in ICE showdown

WILMINGTON – Being the defending Class 2A state champions and undefeated this season, it’s no secret the Wilmington Wildcats are pretty good at the game of football.

As they showed Friday, the Wildcats aren’t so bad at playing keep-away either.

Wilmington took the second-half kickoff in a tie game and put together a 12-play, 80-yard, 8-minute and 4-second drive, junior RB Ryan Kettman running it in for the lead. The Wildcats forced a three-and-out and put together another scoring drive, then answered a Coal City score with a clock-chewing, game-ending possession eating up the final 6:08 for a 21-14 Illinois Central Eight Conference victory on Becker Field at Jeff Reents Stadium.

“Unbelievable,” the eponymous Coach Reents said of the way his team dominated second-half time of possession 18:59-5:01. “We were fortunate to get a three-and-out on defense and give our offense the ball right back and were able to grind it out.

“[We] came up with some big runs there on second, third-and-long, so we were fortunate. ... We were able to keep them off the field a little bit, especially in that third quarter.”

Wilmington moves to 7-0 (5-0) ahead of next week’s showdown at also-unbeaten Manteno. With its first defeat since the season-opener against Morris, Coal City falls to 5-2 (4-1).

Kettman finished with 20 carries for a game-high 135 yards and all three Wilmington touchdowns. That included his 4-yarder to tie it early in the second quarter after Coal City struck first on Gabriel Mchugh’s 41-yard, quick-hitter catch-and-run from QB Zander Meetz; a 15-yard carry to cap the long, game-changing opening drive of the third quarter; and a 20-yard sprint up the center of the field on 4th-and-3 early in the fourth to make it a two-possession game.

“This one’s huge. We played together,” Kettman said. “We didn’t start out great, we had a couple rough spots early but in the second half we played great.

“We played for each other, got the job done. Winning this game is just huge, especially beating your rival at home, getting the job done.”

Fellow Wildcats RB Kyle Farrell added 127 yards on 27 carries for Wilmington, which outgained the Coalers in yards from scrimmage 290-121, including 270-40 on the ground.

Coal City star running back Landin Benson (17 carries for 60 yards) scored a 4-yard fourth-quarter touchdown that drew the visitors to within one score with 6:02 remaining. That would prove to be his final carry of the night, though, as well as Coal City’s final offensive snap.

The Wildcats never gave the ball back.

“That third quarter we had some opportunities defensively to get off the field,” Coalers coach Francis Loughran said. “We just couldn’t do it. They kept the drive going, [our defense] was on the field for quite a while, and they were able to punch it in and play keep-away with the football, limit our opportunities on offense.”

Coal City – which in addition to Benson’s night saw Meents got 5-for-9 passing for 81 yards and a touchdown, Mchugh hauling in three of those completions for 66 yards – is still in excellent shape for a playoff berth. The Coalers can make it official next Friday at home against Herscher.

“Even before the game, I thought our best football was still ahead of us. ...” Loughran said. “Just take care of business the next couple weeks and get us ready for some playoff football.”

Wilmington junior defensive lineman Logan Van Duyne was a thorn in the Coalers’ side all night, finishing with 1 1/2 tackles for loss plus 1 1/2 quarterback sacks.

On the other side, Wilmington’s only negative-yardage offensive play of the 50 it ran was QB Lucas Rink’s kneel-down to end the contest.