DeKalb Denies Yorkville Fifth Victory

Yorkville football coach Karl Hoinkes knew his Foxes had to win Friday night in a Homecoming showdown against DeKalb at Campbell Field in a Northern Illinois Big 12 East Conference contest to become eligible for the IHSA playoffs.

Getting that elusive fifth win had been tough for the Foxes, who had won their first four games and then dropped their first three against conference foes Morris, Rochelle and Kaneland.

Behind a strong rushing game that collected 378 yards, DeKalb (4-4, 1-3) handed Yorkville (4-4, 0-4) its fourth consecutive loss – a 30-13 decision.

 “Sometimes when you are really pressing for something you never get it,” Hoinkes said. “I take the blame. It’s entirely my fault. I’m a little bit shocked. I guess we didn’t prepare our kids for their running game well enough. I’m really sad, because the kids really played hard.”

The game was important for their opponent, too.

“Bottom line, we needed our win tonight,” DeKalb coach Marty Sanders said. “The big point of emphasis this week was to keep the ball out of their hands.”

After neither team scored on their opening drive, DeKalb finally broke through on quarterback Brian Sisler’s 27 yard keeper with seven seconds left in the first quarter.

Yorkville receiver Ilir Emini caught a pass from Nick Gillette and ran 23 yards for a score, but Arton Emini’s extra point hit the crossbar. With 1:45 left in the second, the Foxes trailed 7-6.

After Yorkville kicked the ball out of bounds, one of 14 penalties called on the Foxes for 125 yards, DeKalb drove down field, but the Foxes made a goalline stand. Two plays later, Gillette was sacked in the endzone for a safety and the Barbs led 9-6.

A short free kick by the Foxes set DeKalb up at the Yorkville 46. Five plays later, Sisler dumped the ball off to Devonte Ragsdale for a three-yard touchdown pass, upping the lead to 16-6 with 13.9 left until halftime.

“It pretty much changed the momentum,” said Foxes tailback Neil O’Brien, who rushed for 123 yards on 18 carries. “I felt we could have had a better pass, but we just stayed down. We didn’t put up what we needed to. It’s difficult to go through – four straight wins, four straight losses.”

Sisler (12 carries, 163 yards and two touchdowns) scampered 42 yards for a touchdown with 4:24 left in the third, but Yorkville countered a minute later when Gillette (5 of 13 for 107 yards, two touchdowns and two interceptions) hit Ilir Emini (three catches, 60 yards) for another passing score. This time from 13 yards out and the Foxes trailed 23-13.

Nick Sarver (15 carries, 154 yards) closed out the scoring for the Barbs when he ran in from 23 yards out with 7:52 left in the fourth quarter.

 “I really wanted to win this game,” Ilir Emiri said. “We are really going to try this week. (Sarver) it was his first time at running back and we should have easily stopped him. We couldn’t tackle. We had a lot of missed tackles. I even made a lot of missed tackles. We should have tackled him right away and none of that would have happened.”

“Individually, we just needed everyone to do their jobs,” Sarver said.

The regular season concludes next week as DeKalb plays host to Rochelle and Sycamore visits Yorkville.