Display of guts, heart, desire

There wasn't much in the way of fireworks beyond the Friday night halftime homecoming display at Prospect.

But this wasn't about putting on a show for the standing-room only crowd of nearly 5,000 at George Gattas Stadium.

This was what it should have been when Rolling Meadows came to avenge two losses from last year -- including the one that ended its season on the same field in the Class 7A quarterfinals.

This was about defense, guts, heart, desire and nerve with Mid-Suburban East football supremacy at stake.

When a last-gasp pass was knocked around and finally fell to the turf, the Mustangs, the state's top-ranked Class 7A team, could finally start celebrating a 10-7 victory.

"People say we're overrated and this and that," said Meadows senior running back-linebacker Mikal Johnson. "But we showed we can step up to the challenge when faced with adversity."

The Mustangs faced a variety of challenges en route to their sixth straight win.

After Kevin Serna's tiebreaking field goal on the second play of the fourth quarter, they had to turn back two trips into their territory by Prospect.

Which Meadows did.

"Coming into this game we knew it would be tough," said Meadows senior offensive guard Tim Grant. "It was high intensity. It was awesome.

"We kept pushing and we didn't give up."

Johnson set a tone from the start when he sacked Miles Osei on Prospect's first possession. He ran the ball and played defense like a man possessed.

"Mikal came alive tonight," said Meadows assistant coach John Harrington.

"I came into the season with a lot of expectations but I hadn't played to that level yet," Johnson said after rushing for 83 tough yards and a touchdown on 23 carries. "I said this is the game I have to turn it around."

Two-time defending East champ Prospect did everything it could to keep Meadows from a turnabout of last year's 28-2 and 20-0 defeats.

The Knights went to a three-back, power alignment on offense, patiently milked the clock to keep Meadows' offense off the field and tweaked their defense.

"We learned we can play with anybody," said Prospect senior running back-linebacker Eric Senft. "Now we need to finish to take that extra step to get over the hump to be more successful."

Meadows cleared a big hurdle toward what it hopes will be unprecedented success.

"I wanted to know if we could do it against a top-notch team and tonight we did it, which is great," Meadows defensive coordinator Tony Wolanski said of his crew that allowed 180 yards.

"When we sat down in Rantoul our first goal was to win conference," Grant said of the Mustangs' summer camp. "This is a big stepping stone to where we want to be.

"But we can't take any team easily. We have to play every game like we did today, play hard and try to achieve our goal of winning conference."

This was a good start.