Benet cruises past St. Ignatius

Benet moved to 3-0 on Friday night at Benedictine University in Lisle with a victory over St. Ignatius.

The 35-6 final score, however, indicated something that hadn't appeared so far this season: dominance.

Redwings coach Pat New was stressed to his team the need to move up a level in improvement each week.

"We talked after the first week about that and I think they responded. We need to continue to close the gap between where we are right now and our full potential," he said.

The Wolfpack (2-1) scored the game's first touchdown with 5:46 remaining in the opening quarter and then it was all Benet with 35 unanswered points.

The Redwings' offense threw for almost 200 yards and the defense held St. Ignatius to 59 yards in the air. The Benet defense intercepted the Wolfpack offense twice and a fumble recovery by Will Benish led to the Redwings' final score of the evening.

It was Benet's continuation to use not one but two quality quarterbacks that sparked the offense.

Senior Colin Gillespie showed no ill effects from a broken nose suffered last week in the win over Moline. He ran for two touchdowns and caught another. Passes from him for big yardage and a big run by him helped set up all three Benet TDs of the first half.

"I broke it last week. I felt good. It was not a problem," Gillespie said. "This was the first game since the merger (between the Chicago Catholic League and East Suburban Catholic Conference). The guys did great."

The Wolfpack is in the White Division and Benet in the Orange Division.

Running back Sean Torres also scored in the first half on a 1-yard run that capped a 4-play drive with 9:42 remaining until halftime.

Also making his mark on the Benet victory was senior Michael O'Connor, who ran for one touchdown and threw a scoring pass to Gillespie, at wideout, in the second half.

"Mike has great accuracy and Colin is one of those kids that you can put anywhere," New said.

As the season continues, the Benet coach said it was important for the team to keep focus on two basics to keep the improvement shown so far growing.

"We need to keep getting better in practice, do whatever we need to do and focus on our core plays," he said.