Late Score Lifts Giants Over Wildkits, 35-28

Maybe because it’s been so long since Evanston and Highland Park met on the football field --- since 2014, to be exact --- that Giants’ fans aren’t exactly aware of current events.

At least a half dozen times Friday night the home student section bizarrely chanted “Overrated! Overrated!” to taunt an ETHS program that hasn’t had a winning season since 2023 and certainly isn’t featured in any rankings in the Chicago area.

Right now, the Wildkits are fighting to get back among the football elite under second-year head coach Miles Osei and showed that fight in the second half Friday night after trailing by two touchdowns at the intermission.

But a controversial roughing the kicker call resulted in a 14-point swing in the third quarter, and the Giants scored a victory for the “little guy” when Gustav Crane threw a 6-yard touchdown pass to Max Stevens with 3 minutes, 56 seconds remaining for a 35-28 triumph.

Evanston suffered its second straight loss and is now 3-2 overall. Highland Park, which is competing in the new Central Suburban League Central division this fall, also moved to 3-2 with the crossover win.

Quarterback Crane threw three short touchdown passes --- for 9, 6 and 3 yards --- and also ran 20 yards for a score for the winners, who amassed 235 yards on the ground to go with 88 in the air.

ETHS countered with three TD passes by Aiden Payne to Kamryn Farlow (40 yards and 55 yards) and Justin Johnson (25 yards). Payne also scored a rushing touchdown, but fell short in his effort to rally the Kits from behind one more time when Highland Park’s Mason Auslander grabbed an interception with 2:55 remaining in the game.

The veteran coaching staff on the visitors’ sideline couldn’t recall ever hearing the interpretation of the roughing the kicker call that turned the contest around late in the third period.

Giants’ punter Peter Dimitriou fumbled the snap from center, recovered it and ran at least five yards before getting off the kick. Evanston returned the ball inside the Giants’ 20 --- but the Kits were flagged for pursuing and hitting a punter who had turned into a runner.

That’s not the way the officials saw it. Their interpretation? That Dimitriou was still considered a kicker, not a runner, until he came within one yard of the line of scrimmage and that he should continue to be protected.

That’s a call that left all of the ETHS coaches scratching their heads.

“We’re all humans, and we all make errors. We just had to battle through it,” Osei said. “I’ll defer to the referees. We just had to react better to the call they made.

“Coming back in the second half (down 21-14) was definitely a positive. I’ve seen flashes from this team. We just need sustained discipline when we have adverse moments like that. We have our moments --- and then we don’t.”

Most of Highland Park’s moments came in third down situations. The Giants converted 9 of 12 third down situations to constantly keep their drives alive. They took a 28-21 edge three plays after the roughing the kicker incident, but Evanston answered with a game-tying score thanks to back-to-back pass interference calls that moved the ball to the HP 29-yard line.

After a 4-yard gain by Sean Hopson Jr. (14 carries for 117 yards), Payne pitched a short pass to Johnson, who broke one tackle and then spun into the end zone to tie the contest at 28-all.

Highland Park owned all the momentum at halftime after scoring twice in the final 50 seconds of the second quarter. Crane’s 3-yard TD pass to Owen Loftus climaxed a 66-yard scoring drive, and after Payne lost a fumble on the next ETHS play, Crane capitalized with a 9-yard scoring pass to Dimitriou on third down.

The crossover meeting called attention to a scenario that has largely flown under the radar this fall. The Central Suburban League has created three separate divisions for football this year, consisting of the South (ETHS, New Trier, Maine South), North (Niles North, Vernon Hills, Maine East, Maine West) and Central (Deerfield, Highland Park, Niles West, Glenbrook North) groupings.

The CSL has used a two-division format since 1972-73, but decided to change the alignment for football-only this year after ending its scheduling arrangement with the Mid-Suburban League last November.

The MSL had dominated the head-to-head grid matchups with the CSL for eight years and didn’t agree when CSL officials proposed limiting the crossover schedule to just one week instead of two. MSL coaches weren’t about to sacrifice vital regular season victories they thought would get them into the Illinois High School Association state playoffs.

After the two sides agreed to disagree, the IHSA decided to expand the state playoffs, a move that eased scheduling concerns for many schools.

The CSL put a new plan into effect and four crossover games are on the schedule this fall within the conference, along with three division contests, for every school.

Evanston Athletic Director Chris Livatino noted that the new set-up might be only temporary --- or it might be permanent.

“This could be the only year there’s a Central division champion,” Livatino said. “We thought if we created this quad system it would give the ‘middle (enrollment) schools’ a chance to play more games against schools of a similar size.

“If the IHSA playoffs remain the same, this could just be a one-year thing. We’ll talk about it again next month. We’re trying to create a more competitive playing field within our conference with more opportunities for all the schools.

“We’ll evaluate how this new alignment works --- explore opportunities with other conferences --- and make the best decision for our league.”