I haven't enjoyed a discussion as much as I have this one, in maybe 20 years on this Board. Bravo to all, especially Mr. Sager, for the comprehensive and detailed analysis. As has been said, the alignment that slowly evolved at NCC beginning in the early John Thorne era until today, is really unprecedented. Having played at NCC in the late 90's, I always believed NCC was a sleeping giant compared to the other CCIW schools. Bill Mack (another Hall of Fame H.S. coach in Illinois until he was hired at NCC) never got a fraction of the support from the Admin that the Thornes and Brad Spencer have been able to enjoy over the last 20 plus years. The only way I see the NCC machine being toppled for the foreseeable future is from within. Whether it's from the College's Admin or key coaching personnel leaving (which is unlikely based on their ties to the school and young families) it does not seem likely that any school outside of Wheaton has the ability recruit at a level even close as there is no comparable draw, and Wheaton's recruiting is really an outlier as there's a strong religious component that isn't comparable to any other CCIW school.

Quote from: GusD on September 10, 2025, 08:47:42 PM

Quote from: washdupcard on January 31, 2025, 01:03:46 PM

Quote from: GusD on January 30, 2025, 01:14:46 PM

Quote from: lmitzel on January 29, 2025, 12:02:01 PM

Quote from: washdupcard on January 29, 2025, 11:46:56 AMIt's listed on NCC's 2025 schedule.

https://northcentralcardinals.com/sports/football/schedule

Beat me to it; I just got the app ping that the schedule was out.

NCC hosts Oshkosh on Saturday 9/13.

Playing on September 13th at 1 PM. That makes perfect sense especially in the era of increased player (not to mention fans) safety. It'll probably only be about 90 degrees 🫠. The game should be played at 6:00. And if Oshkosh is coming in Friday, play at 11 AM. Avoid the hottest part of the day plus UWO gets home a lot earlier.

I could see your point if NCC was in the South, but it's in Northern Illinois...the average high temperature in mid September is 77 degrees. Referring to this as a player or fan safety is just absurd.

https://weatherspark.com/m/13359/9/Average-Weather-in-September-in-Naperville-Illinois-United-States

You should have seen my point the minute you knew the game was in September, washdupcard. At this moment the predicted high in Naperville for this Saturday is indeed 90 degrees! At that temperature it won't be at all surprising to see players cramping up like crazy, and possibly passing out. And the fans sitting in the west facing stands absent of even a bit of shade will be baking like a sweet potato pie, and subject to the same possible effects as the players. So referring to these conditions as a question of player/fan safety is absurd huh??
Think again. Perhaps you've forgotten that over the years there have been several September games with temps in the 80s. In the interest of safety, not to mention comfort, September games should be played at night.

A blazing 73 degrees at kickoff today in Naperville. 

Quote from: robertgoulet on September 11, 2025, 03:34:18 PM

Quote from: NCC2010 on September 11, 2025, 03:21:06 PM

Quote from: robertgoulet on September 11, 2025, 12:17:52 PM

Quote from: Gregory Sager on September 11, 2025, 10:46:22 AMExpect a big announcement to come out of Brainard Street within the next few days.

That's all that I'll say about it.

Adding a school, eh?

sounds like it'll be from Wisconsin.

https://x.com/BQuillmanQcast/status/1966215536016052231 

Well that narrows it down to a handful since it's safe to assume the WIAC schools won't be leaving for CCIW.

My money is on Concordia-Wisconsin as I believe they're already an associate member for one or more other sports; not to mention, they are geographically close to Carroll and Carthage.

And today the forecasted high is 82 degrees. Next Saturday it's 75, so what's your point? It's mid-September in Northern Illinois. The fact that it might possibly be 90 on a random afternoon in Naperville, is not a player or fan safety issue. These players have been practicing in that type of weather for months. Has the National Weather Service issued an extreme heat warning for Saturday, advising people not to be outside or exerting themselves? That would be a safety issue. If the game was scheduled in mid July when the average high is approximately 86 degrees, then I'd possibly see your point. There are multiple high schools in the Chicago area that play Saturday afternoon games during this time period, is that also a safety issue? The fact that you might be uncomfortable doesn't make it a safety issue. To be clear, I hate the heat (yet live in Florida...go figure the one...) and I hated playing in any elevated temps...but that doesn't make it a safety issue for simply scheduling a Saturday afternoon football game in Northern Illinois when its just as likely (or more likely) to be in the high 70's than in the high 80's.

Quote from: GusD on January 30, 2025, 01:14:46 PM

Quote from: lmitzel on January 29, 2025, 12:02:01 PM

Quote from: washdupcard on January 29, 2025, 11:46:56 AM

Quote from: robertgoulet on January 24, 2025, 04:54:36 PM

Quote from: NCC2010 on January 24, 2025, 03:57:41 PMNo idea if true or not but I saw on X that NCC will be playing Oshkosh for their out of conference game next season.

https://x.com/dshot1992/status/1880390257717440675?s=46&t=2LpDHlmLWW7A7c0oIFbv5Q

https://x.com/dshot1992/status/1880680732122911047?s=46&t=2LpDHlmLWW7A7c0oIFbv5Q

I'd be willing to bet that it is next season and the season following, considering they played Wheaton in a home and away series the last 2 seasons.

It's listed on NCC's 2025 schedule.

https://northcentralcardinals.com/sports/football/schedule

Beat me to it; I just got the app ping that the schedule was out.

NCC hosts Oshkosh on Saturday 9/13.

Playing on September 13th at 1 PM. That makes perfect sense especially in the era of increased player (not to mention fans) safety. It'll probably only be about 90 degrees 🫠. The game should be played at 6:00. And if Oshkosh is coming in Friday, play at 11 AM. Avoid the hottest part of the day plus UWO gets home a lot earlier.

I could see your point if NCC was in the South, but it's in Northern Illinois...the average high temperature in mid September is 77 degrees. Referring to this as a player or fan safety is just absurd.

https://weatherspark.com/m/13359/9/Average-Weather-in-September-in-Naperville-Illinois-United-States

Quote from: robertgoulet on January 24, 2025, 04:54:36 PM

Quote from: NCC2010 on January 24, 2025, 03:57:41 PMNo idea if true or not but I saw on X that NCC will be playing Oshkosh for their out of conference game next season.

https://x.com/dshot1992/status/1880390257717440675?s=46&t=2LpDHlmLWW7A7c0oIFbv5Q

https://x.com/dshot1992/status/1880680732122911047?s=46&t=2LpDHlmLWW7A7c0oIFbv5Q

I'd be willing to bet that it is next season and the season following, considering they played Wheaton in a home and away series the last 2 seasons.

It's listed on NCC's 2025 schedule.

https://northcentralcardinals.com/sports/football/schedule

Quote from: D3fanboy on December 09, 2024, 03:56:03 PM

Quote from: Pat Coleman on December 09, 2024, 02:41:04 PMAdmittedly, North Central fans did not have reason to follow the playoffs when Springfield made its deepest run, but Springfield did win a playoff game as recently as 2022.

Here's a little more on Springfield from Greg's column at the end of October:
https://d3football.com/columns/around-the-nation/2024/springfield-running-away-from-opponents


Are you trying to say that there was D3 football prior to the great and powerful Luke Lehnen?

I don't get the shade toward Lehnan. I don't know the kid personally, but everything I've heard is that he's a great young man. Not to mention the fact that he's lost only 2 games in four years (both in the Stagg Bowl), started every game for the first or second best team in D3 since the day he arrived, set some insane school and NCAA records, and won every award thats available. I'd hope your sarcasm is more directed at some NCC fans. There are certainly some other great QB's in D3...but if anyone deserves the hype...it's this kid. He has most definitely earned it in literally every way possible.

Quote from: robertgoulet on December 09, 2024, 10:01:22 AMI guess if there is one type of team you'd want to play when you have secondary injuries it's a team that doesn't throw.

Was wondering the same about the press man. A dangerous way to play when there's a mobile QB working out of a spread. Lots of DBs with their backs to the ball.

I'm disappointed you don't remember Coach DeGeorge's famous line "it takes 12 guys to stop the option..."  Apparently, just about everyone my class played against had 13 .

Quote from: Gregory Sager on December 09, 2024, 03:39:32 PM

Quote from: robertgoulet on December 09, 2024, 09:12:41 AMWould be interesting to be in the NCC practices this week. Being the same age as Coach Spencer, we are at the tail end of the generation where you would run into the triple option in jr tackle/high school a couple of times/season.

I suspect that that depends upon where you attend high school. If you're way out in the country, where high schools are small and the student body is thus far less likely to have a sufficient number of big boys to properly staff a standard-issue offensive line, the triple option -- in which quick feet rather than gargantuan size is the primary quality preferred in offensive linemen -- has long been commonplace.

I'll admit that perhaps that's changed in the past dozen years, especially given the fact that King Corn Syrup has made obesity rampant in younger Millennials and in Gen Z. Today's big-boned fat kid trying and failing to climb the rope in eighth-grade gym class is tomorrow's 260-pound sophomore who is conditioned enough to thrive as an offensive tackle on the high school football team. But the entire reason why Scott Pethtel thought that he could build a successful program in that unlikeliest of locations, the North Side of Chicago, was because there were so many rural midwestern high school football teams that used the triple option -- football teams that were thus overlooked for the most part by college coaches who weren't interested in looking at kids from schools that never threw a pass if they could help it -- that he would have a vast recruiting footprint almost all to himself. It was a Moneyball solution to a Moneyball problem, even though Scott told me that he'd never read Moneyball or seen the movie, and to this day I still think that it was a think-outside-the-box stroke of genius on his part. The problem was that his staff just couldn't recruit well enough to allow North Park to flip the script in CCIW games, particularly on the defensive side of the ball (as one of his defensive assistants admitted to me, NPU had to use linebackers as safeties and safeties as cornerbacks). Ripon employed the same recruiting philosophy, as the Red Hawks featured a lot of small-town kids as well as kids from small private schools across the country when Ripon ran the triple option.

(The irony is that, despite the fact that the use of the triple option was supposed to bring in farmboy studs, the two most successful offensive players NPU had during the Pethtel era were Tyler Krebs from Cary-Grove and Matt Hassan from Glenbard West.)

Cary-Grove runs the Triple Option to a degree of success and precision few others ever have been able to achieve.

Whoops looks like CarollFan beat me too it.

Speaking of the NCC O-line...this clip basically says it all.

https://x.com/Pritzkersgunt/status/1838183989539950705

Quote from: NCC2010 on September 13, 2024, 10:35:36 AMexcited for NCC to kickoff the season tomorrow night, these are my biggest question marks as we enter the season:

Offense - Will there be a go-to WR in the passing game? We have had an All-American level receiver every season since 2019 (Kamienski, then Hardy). Our receivers usually get tons of 1 on 1 looks since teams sellout to stop the run game, so interested to see if any of them are able to take advantage in the same way Hardy and others did in the past.  If i had to pick one, it would probably be Jack Rummell to be that guy.

Defense - Who will be the boundary corner and will they be trusted in the same way as Walker and Beesley were? The front 7 is returning 5 starters, including all 3 linebackers as graduates, and should be solid.  The Shane Dierking called defenses thus far have relied on IMO the 2 best corners NCC has ever had locking down 1 side of the field.  The defense was simply not the same last season once Antwain Walker got hurt. My guess is Jahron Williams will start off as the boundary corner due to his length and physicality. Very interested to see if we adjust from leaving the boundary corner on an island the majority of the time or if the coaching staff believes they have a corner that talented.

Special teams - hoping the kicking situation improves this year. Kicking issues arent a problem when you blow teams out in the regular season but it was a HUGE factor in the title game.  they were forced to go for 4th and goal from the 15+ instead of kicking a somewhat routine FG.

really looking forward to the season and very happy that we get to face a formidable opponent in the opening game.

"The Shane Dierking called defenses thus far have relied on IMO the 2 best corners NCC has ever had locking down 1 side of the field..." 

Respectfully, I think Norman "Junebug" Robinson (the 1999 CCIW Co-Defensive Player of the Year on an absolutely awful 2-7 team and NCC Athletics Hall of Famer) belongs in this conversation. It is incredibly hard to be selected for any of the player of the year awards in the CCIW when you're on a bad team unless you are truly exceptional. Not to mention that he played in a defensive scheme in which he was in man coverage about 95% of the time as the field side cover corner.

Quote from: hazzben on December 16, 2022, 07:47:39 PM
Absolute garbage if they call targeting on that hit. The QB is a runner at that point.

Horrendous call!

Quote from: cardinaldad on December 13, 2022, 11:40:32 AM
I have been following Cardinal football for 20 or so years. During John Thorne's 1st year, he promised that the Cards would play and we would see exciting football. He sure kept his promise, didn't he? It has been a thrill watching this program grow and develop to what it is today! I can't put into words how proud I am of all the past and present Cardinal players!!!! Go get 'em Cards! Bring home the walnut and bronze!

As a pre-Thorne era player, it is absolutely incredible to see them become one of the most dominant teams in the country. I remember games where we'd be lucky to score 7 points, and it just felt like we were completely overmatched.

Somewhat related, it's also one of the reasons that Brad Spencer is in many ways the perfect coach for NCC. Raised around the school and the program. First played pre-Thorne...played for Thorne...finished as all time leading receiver...worked his way up the coaching ladder...became instrumental in their continued success. He's experienced every facet of NCC football, and literally seen it all.  From getting dominated from the likes of Wheaton, Augie, IWU to dominating the CCIW over the last 12 years. Perhaps no person better personifies what it is to be a Cardinal and how far NCC has truly come. (Unless you count Cardalum's chain-gang work...that's the best he's performed on the field in 30+ years).

Quote from: CardinalAlum on October 17, 2021, 06:30:24 PM

Quote from: TrueGreen on October 17, 2021, 05:55:48 PM

Quote from: CardinalAlum on October 17, 2021, 05:39:56 PM

Quote from: Gregory Sager on October 17, 2021, 05:14:51 PM

Even if the city of Naperville doesn't secede from the state of Illinois over the next six days, Norm & Co. are still going to be SOL on Saturday. The Cardinals are going to rip your alma mater's team into green confetti. Three weeks after that it'll be my alma mater's team whose turn it'll be to get fed into the shredder. There's no use wishing otherwise.

😂😂😂 

GS,

This might be my favorite post of yours to date!  Let's call it what it is....there's no love lost regarding Norm Eash. Another big win by the Cards would be pretty satisfying to so many!

and by "so many", you are including many very loyal Titans.

That's a really tough place to be in.  I have been there in the Pre Thorne era at NCC.  Knowing that losses are the best thing long term for your school is tough.  Kudos for sticking it out.

Our late 90's "offense" makes so much more sense now!  I wish I knew the fix was in before I battered by brains out. 

Quote from: CardinalAlum on December 16, 2019, 09:03:11 PM

Quote from: AndOne on December 16, 2019, 07:03:31 PM

Quote from: jdlenzD3 on December 15, 2019, 05:29:20 PM
North Central has been designated as the home team for this year's Stagg Bowl.

Wondering if the home designation entitles the Cardinals to choose what color jerseys they'll wear and, if so, whether they will go with their white, red, or black ones. My money is on white. 

Cards will be wearing White helmet, Red Jersey, white pants.

No better look than the old school color format.