By Greg Halbleib
The final Corn Belt Conference title will be decided in the highlight of Week 8 of the WJBC Friday Night High School Football Extravaganza.
Central Catholic (6-1, 5-0) hosts Mahomet-Seymour (5-2, 5-0) to determine the final title-holder before the league breaks up at the end of the school year. Host Saints coach Mike Moews says the title has been a season-long goal.
“That was the first goal the kids put on the board,” Moews said. “They seem to be pretty focused on getting that done. All you can ask is for the opportunity, so no excuses, just get the job done.”
Normal Community travels to Danville in a battle of teams with identical records of 6-1 overall and 5-1 in the Big Twelve Conference. Ironmen coach Wes Temples expects a post-season atmosphere.
“It’s going to feel like a playoff game,” said Temples. “Obviously, you have two playoff teams. We’re excited about it. You want to be in these games, especially heading into the playoffs.”
Normal West (3-4, 3-3 Big Twelve) continues to fight for a post-season chance with another big test in Peoria against Richwoods (1-6, 1-5). West coach Darren Hess continues to emphasize the must-win nature of the season’s final games.
“We kind of look forward to this opportunity,” Hess said. “Again, we have another quality opponent. Can we keep improving and move our program forward? It’s a must-win for us.”
Bloomington (4-3, 3-3 Big Twelve) refuses to overlook winless Urbana in Friday’s road game for the Purple Raiders of coach Joe Walters.
“I don’t want to overlook Urbana in any way because they’re very athletic,” said Walters. “They haven’t won a game, but in the Big Twelve you can be pretty good and not win a game. We’re 3-3 in the Big Twelve, 4-3 overall, and it’s just a tough conference, so you can’t look at that and say they’re not very good.”
U-High (2-5, 2-3 Corn Belt) visits Pontiac (3-4, 2-3) in a tussle at Williamson Field. Play-by-play can be heard on WJEZ-FM 98.9 in Livingston County and online at WJEZ.com in addition to updates on the WJBC Friday Night Extravaganza. U-High coach Trevor Von Bruenchenhein wants to contain Pontiac’s running game.
“It’s kind of the same deal as Mahomet-Seymour last week–we’ve got to stop the run,” Von Bruenchenhein said. “They do some interesting things in the run game that we’ve got to stop, some things we haven’t seen yet this year. With that being said, if we can handle the run game and fight with the same intensity as we did last week, I think we’ll put ourselves in a good chance to win this game.”
The Extravaganza also features updates from Deer Creek-Mackinaw (7-0, 3-0 Heart of Illinois Conference Large) at Eureka (5-2, 2-1). Pre-game begins on WJBC-AM 1230 and WJBC.com at 6:10 with updates every quarter hour and post-game until 11:00. Updates can also be found on Twitter (@WJBCHSFootball, #WJBCHSFB).
The Bloomington Thunder host the Chicago Steel at 7 p.m. on WJBC.com while the Illinois State volleyball team plays a home match against Missouri State on WJBC.com.
Greg Halbleib can be reached at [email protected].
