Ethan McCarter’s punt return TD sparks DeKalb rout at Plainfield South

PLAINFIELD — DeKalb’s offense had stalled on two straight drives, and after its defense forced a Plainfield South three-and-out on two straight possessions, Ethan McCarter wanted to give his team a short field.

Instead, McCarter gave his team seven points on a punt-return touchdown and control of the game in a 48-14 win on Friday.

“I just hit two cuts and saw an open field” said McCarter, who also scored on a 50-yard jet sweep in the fourth quarter to push the Barbs’ lead to 34-7. “I knew my speed was going to get me there and took it to the house.”

McCarter returned the Jack Kranc punt 68 yards for a score, pushing the lead to 14-0. After a third straight South three-and-out – aided by a quarterback hurry and a sack by Nathan Smith on consecutive plays – the DeKalb offense found its groove again.

Talen Tate went 45 yards for a score on the fifth play of the drive and DeKalb’s lead grew to 21-0. Tate finished the day with 102 yards on nine carries.

“I think that sparked it a lot,” McCarter said. “After that we started scoring every drive, doing really good. It really contributed to our momentum.”

On the drive before the punt return TD, the Barbs also had a short field thanks to McCarter, but quarterback Adrien McVicar was intercepted by Ryan Cramer.

After forcing a three-and-out on the first drive of the game, DeKalb took over and scored on its first possession. McVicar had a 32-yard pass to Colin Hatton, then Jamari Brown punched it in from 5-yards out after the Barbs started on a short field thanks to a 20-yard return by McCarter.

“The punt return was huge cause I feel like we got a little tense,” DeKalb coach Derek Schneeman said. “It was still early in the game, we scored but then had two drives that stalled. Ethan made a play.”

South threatened to score late in the second quarter, running six plays in the DeKalb red zone but coming up empty-handed. Austin Martin had an interception to end the drive.

The Barb defense keyed in on Cougar running back Brian Stanton, who was a workhorse in a win last week. But after he carried it nine times for 37 yards in the first quarter, he finished with 80 yards on 18 carries.

“We got our butt kicks, and that’s my fault,” South coach Bill Bicker said. “I didn’t have them ready to play. ... We didn’t really adjust well to their adjustments from what we saw on film. They were more physical than we were. We just got our butts kicked in every aspect. Just not a good coaching performance by Bill Bicker tonight.”

South started both drives in DeKalb territory in the third quarter, but couldn’t score either time. Smith stuffed Stanton on a fourth-and-2 from the DeKalb 27, then on the next series Connor Folliard overthrew a wide-open Caden Pierceall.

DeKalb capitalized on that second stop, getting a 34-yard run from Tate to set up a 1-yard plunge by McVicar for a 27-0 lead early in the fourth.

The Cougars answered on the next series when Folliard found Pierceall in stride for a 48-yard touchdown pass, ending the DeKalb shutout attempt.

After McCarter’s sweep, the Cougars got another score on a 46-yard pass from Folliard to Stanton. DeKalb answered right back with a 1-yard run by Brown, who finished the day 91 yards on 24 carries.

Folliard threw for 220 yards in the loss. Stanton had three catches for 64 yards and Pierceall had four for 65.

“We knew they were keying Brian, so we just didn’t throw to Brian. Sometimes it’s that simple,” Bicker said “Because they were setting the defense to contain Brian and control Brian – smart coaching by them – we knew we’d get some 1-on-1 matchups with our other guys. ... The one thing we left tonight with at least positive with is we feel positive about our passing game moving forward. We might have to rely on it more and that’s not a bad thing.”

The Cougars fell to 1-1 with the loss, while the Barbs bounced back from a loss to Sycamore.

“We needed a bounce-back win after last week,” Schneeman said. “We knew that we weren’t the team that showed up last Friday against Sycamore. It’s a great overall team win and it was exactly what we needed.”