After beating the tough, 6th-ranked Peoria High School Lions last Friday, the Normal West Wildcats, (3-2), look to build off their momentum against the 8A Waubonsie Valley Warriors tonight, Friday, Oct. 4 at home.
Beating the Lions was a tough challenge, with their high-octane offense putting up 86 points against their opponent in week 4.
However, West’s defense showed up ready to play by allowing only 18 points total. With a dominant performance, they controlled the game the whole time.
“It was pretty fun to watch and, you know, this is the most physical I’ve seen our football team this year. We were struggling to start the season, but to see them play like they did Friday was pretty awesome,” Wide Receivers and Special Teams coach DT Thornton boasts.
To prepare for a team like Peoria, the Wildcats started very physical, by running the toughest, physical skill to start the week to get ready, making sure they game-planned super well throughout the whole week.
“Yeah, so we just started off making sure our players were physical. Peoria High is a very good and physical football team, and we don’t see that type of team every week, so we start[ed] off with very physical ‘king of the boards’ with a lot of tackling drills…” Thornton adds.
All of the hard work throughout last week paid off as the Wildcats pulled off the 20-18 upset heading into Homecoming weekend.
Nate Fincham, in his 7th year as head coach, is very pleased with the team’s performance last Friday, noting that although games like that are going to give him a “heart attack,” he is proud of their efforts all week.
“For them to come into a game without multiple key starters on both sides of the ball against a top ranked team in the state of Illinois is very difficult. But they approached the week of practice in the right way, everyone played together and for each other in all three phases. Lastly, I told them that I was proud of them for standing back up after the Bloomington game. They could have easily shut it down after that game, but they worked extremely hard all week and that showed against Peoria,” Fincham notes.
Prior to last week’s big win, the Wildcats got off to a bit of a slow start to begin the season. They took two losses to inter-city rivals Normal Community (48-7) and Bloomington High School (48-16) in the two previous weeks.
Coach Thornton claimed the team and staff were not too discouraged by the losses, though.
“Those two games don’t dictate how our season is going to go. We let them know that we still have a lot of football left, and the regular season then we’re going to make a run in the postseason,” Thornton notes.
West has also dealt with injuries to key players thus far in the season, but Thornton, along with the other coaches, has stressed to the players to “always praise the next guy up mentality so we always just make sure you know that the next person you know who’s in that spot is always ready to go.”
This positive mindset indefinitely has helped prepare the Wildcats to build off of last week’s win, but another huge factor that helps the team actually has little to do with the players on the field.
“It helps that the student section keeps the kids pumped up too, so we appreciate you guys,” Line coach Kyrin Tucker points out.
The student section always goes a long way by chirping and getting into the opponent’s head or by getting so loud that the quarterback can’t hear what the coach is calling.
It’s clear that while the team is showing “Wildcat Energy” on the field with their play, the students are putting it on full display from the stands.
And the Wildcats will indefinitely need the student section’s energy during this Friday’s showdown against Waubonsie High School.
With the big win and momentum against Peoria High in the rear view mirror and the playoffs right around the corner, the Wildcats are focused and ready going into tonight’s matchup.
“The message I have been trying to get across to the team is that ‘success is never owned; it is rented’ and that we have to put in the work this week in order to have success again. Winning big games like last week tends to give you an over inflated confidence, and I feel like that has been both a positive and negative for us this week,” Head Coach Nate Fincham states.
With 4 regular-season games left, including 2 at home, Coach Thornton reminds everyone that “right now we’re just focusing on Waubonsie and then you know we’ll finish out the regular season as strong as we can.”
Coach Kyrin Tucker also has a special message for the fans by telling them “just keep bringing the energy for us all night–that’s all we ask.”
With the right mindset and a strong student section behind them, the Wildcats are ready to conquer the challenge of Waubonsie High School.
“The best way to build momentum would be to keep that underdog mindset like we did last week and come out firing early because they have a long road ahead of them and just hit them in the mouth early,” Senior versatile star, Cooper Temples states.
The game will be tough, but with the heart the Wildcats showed in week 5, it is sure to be another great game of football.
Kickoff will be at 7pm at Wildcat Stadium. The student section theme is Wild West.