Manteno is playing with a lot of confidence, and that was evident Sept. 4 at Herscher in its Illinois Central Eight opener.
In the span of 25 seconds at the start of the second half the Panthers scored 14 points to remove any doubts on a steamy night in the 48-13 victory over the Tigers.
Senior Briggs Cann returned the second-half kickoff 85 yards for a touchdown before the Panthers (3-0, 1-0 ICE) covered the ensuing kickoff at the Herscher 32-yard line. On the next play Logan Bufford tossed a 32-yard strike to Jack Gotkowski with 11:35 left in the third.
“Yeah, we wanted to put it away quick,” Cann said. “We stuck to our coach’s plan today. Last year, we kind of had a bad taste in our mouth going out on that last play, and we just said, ‘Hey, let’s come here at their home field and just punch them in the mouth and get it over with. Get out of here.”
The 14 points extended a 34-6 halftime bulge.
Cann said he took coach RJ Haines’ advice on returning the kick.
“The previous kickoff before that I missed the hole, but my coach told me, pulled me aside, said, “Hey, look left, look right, find that hole,’’ he said. “I found the hole and just hit it, and boom, we’re off.”
Indeed, the Panthers are off to their first 3-0 start since 2024 when they won their first seven games. Haines said he was happy with how his team played.
“It was a tough week of practice with the heat and everything,” he said.”The first two weeks, of course, we won football games, but we hadn’t put together a complete game and played real clean. So I was happy that the kids came out and executed early, offensively and defensively, and special teams.”
Manteno led 13-0 after the first quarter on a 2-yard TD run by Bufford before Nick Honkisz sprinted in from 16 yards out. Bufford scored on a 5-yard run and Honkisz ran down the left sideline 84 yards for another touchdown and a 28-6 lead with 4:55 left in the second quarter.
Honkisz finished with 215 yards rushing and two touchdowns, while Bufford also tossed a TD pass to David Asher.
“Ground and pound, punch them in the face, just run the ball at will. That’s what we did,” Honkisz said. “Our quarterback Logan Bufford backed them off, got the dudes out the box, and they just couldn’t stop us.”
Honkisz said last year’s 28-23 loss to Herscher was still fresh.
“We weren’t happy after that game, and we for sure wanted it back,” he said.. This was a special one for me.”
Manteno hosts Reed-Custer (2-1, 1-0) at 7 p.m. Sept. 11 in another ICE battle.
“It’s good to come out and play well in the conference opener,” Haines said. “We’ve got another big game coming in Reed-Custer. They always play us well, so we’ll have to get back to work.”
“One game at a time,” Honkisz said.
Crete-Monee 65, Thornton 12: Amarre Carey ran for 220 yards and three touchdowns as the visiting Warriors (2-1, 1-0 Southland) rolled to a dominant win on Sept. 4.
Crete hosts Thornridge on Sept. 11. Kickoff is set for 6 p.m.
Wilmington 48, Peotone 8: Wayde Beechy ran seven times for 48 yards and a touchdown for the host Blue Devils (2-1, 0-1 ICE) on Sept. 4. Alex Chenoweth had a team-high seven tackles for Peotone.
Peotone hosts Lisle at 7 p.m. Sept. 11.
Vedette staff contributed to this story.