By Patrick Coleman
D3sports.com
NAPERVILLE, Ill. — North Central scored three touchdowns on big plays in the first half, including a pick-six by defensive end Eli Renick, and the Cardinals rolled into the Division III football national championship game for the sixth consecutive season, defeating John Carroll 41-21.
The Cardinals will face UW-River Falls (13-1), which defeated Johns Hopkins 48-41 in Saturday’s other national semifinal.
Already up 7-0 after a methodical game-opening drive, the Cardinals and quarterback Garret Wilson hit Jack Rummell on a deep ball down the middle and he took it the rest of the way for a 71-yard touchdown to make it 14-0 with 3:57 to play in the half. John Carroll’s next drive stalled when JP Sullivan knocked down a fourth-down pass by Nick Semptimphelter. North Central (14-0) faced a third-and-8 from the 31 on the following drive when Wilson found Rummell right at the sticks. But Rummell made John Carroll cornerback Dylan Crasi miss, spun off of him, and took it the final 23 yards to the end zone for a touchdown and a 21-0 lead.
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| Tyren Montgomery broke out for one long 73-yard touchdown catch, but over the rest of the game, JCU averaged 5.1 yards per pass attempt. John Carroll athletics photo by Jose Figueroa |
John Carroll (12-2) was beginning to put a drive together and had the ball deep in Cardinals territory after Semptimphelter found Tyren Montgomery for a 22-yard gain down to the 26. But on the next play, Sullivan broke through to pressure the Blue Streaks quarterback, and Semptimphelter tried to dump off the pass to avoid the sack, but it ended up right in the hands of North Central defensive end Eli Renick. Renick returned it 60 yards for a touchdown to make it 28-0 at the half.
"I always tell him, do something cool," Wilson said after the game. "So that third-and-8 by Jack was pretty cool. Eli's pick-six was pretty cool."
Not just pretty cool. How about the biggest play of his life?
"First of all, shout out to JP. Without him, that wouldn't have been possible," Renick said. "And I'd say what was going through my head was, I'm probably about to get hawked. I need to protect this ball.
"I just saw the (stat) sheet, it said 60 yards and I thought it was longer than that. As soon as I stepped in the end zone, I'm like, holy crap. I just scored a touchdown in the semifinals. But the whole week coach (DJ Warkenthien) was telling me that you're gonna make a big play in this game. Just do your job and go out there and play like I how I know you can play. And he was right. That was probably the biggest play of my life so far."
John Carroll also came up empty on its first possession of the third quarter, and North Central tacked on a 28-yard Aidan Ellison field goal to make it 31-0. The Blue Streaks scored on consecutive drives, including a 73-yard catch and run by Montgomery, but they came sandwiched around a Wilson touchdown run and it was 38-14 early in the fourth. JCU got as close as the North Central 24 before turning the ball over on downs with 9:32 to play.
Wilson ended with 324 passing yards, for the first 300-yard game of his North Central career. Rummell’s 179 yards were a career high as part of an evening with six catches and two touchdowns. Donovan McNeal led all rushers with 160 yards on 18 carries.
Semptimphelter ended the day 34-for-47 passing for 307 yards and three touchdowns, meaning that he did indeed set the NCAA record for completion percentage in a season, with 77.9%, and John Carroll's team total of 77.16% was the NCAA record as well.