MSL Football: Recalling Barrington's 1998 Runner-Up Run
Series of Fantastic Playoff Finishes Fueled Trip to State Title Game
There was no perfect Hollywood ending in 1998 for the most successful football team in Barrington history. But there were plenty of thrills that gave its fans chills in a memorable playoff run that resulted in a trip to the Class 6A state championship game at Illinois State University’s Hancock Stadium in Normal.
Barrington made an unbeaten run to the football semifinals for the first time in 25 years before losing to Lincoln-Way East. The 1998 team had a similar penchant for dramatic turnarounds as it won its first 13 games before losing to powerhouse Wheaton Warrenville South in the title game.
Great Expectations in ‘98
The expectations and excitement were high for Barrington football going into the 1998 season. A year earlier it won its first playoff game in 14 years with a 24-21 comeback over Downers Grove North. A 30-7 loss at eventual 6A champion Lincoln-Way in the second round and 8-3 season was considered a stepping stone to bigger and better days ahead.
Two Daily Herald All-Area picks, running back Dan Pohlman and wide receiver Kyle Derickson, were among the returnees. So was quarterback Scott Sagehorn, who engineered the playoff comeback, and receiver-defensive back Tim Meyer. One concern was rebuilding the offensive line where senior center Dave Burton was the only returning starter.
“We’re real motivated to get started,” Derickson said on the first day practice officially started. “We’ve been talking about this since the first Monday after the game against Lincoln-Way.”
Head coach Al Kamradt also liked what he saw going into his ninth year as the head coach. Kamradt was a two-time all-state tight end at Taft on Chicago’s northwest side and played on Indiana’s only Rose Bowl team in 1968 that lost to USC and O.J. Simpson.
“Our guys have such a positive attitude about everything. It’s exciting and fun to go out there,” Kamradt said. “As long as we maintain that and avoid injury we could have a good year.”
Barrington breezed through its first four games with little trouble, but started play in the new Mid-Suburban West by falling behind Fremd by a touchdown, before Sagehorn threw 2 TD passes and Pohlman ran for the other in an 18-10 victory. The revamped defense run by young coordinator Joe Sanchez then basically pitched three consecutive shutouts. The only score in a 25-7 win over Schaumburg in Week 8 came on a fumble return as the Broncos allowed only 76 yards.
Kamradt’s decision during the summer to put his best athletes in the secondary in Derickson, Meyer, Matt Garms and Joe Butera was paying off. But they would have a big challenge in the MSL West finale against Conant and future pro quarterback Russ Michna. Barrington drove 73 yards in 15 plays to win 22-19 on Sagehorn’s TD pass to Meyer with 1:52 to play.
“It was great we had to come back and great we had a close game,” Kamradt said. “And we had to play a good team.”
The playoff opener was not close as Barrington cruised past Homewood-Flossmoor 38-0. But the tough tests against high-level competition were on the horizon.
Taking a Stand
Barrington’s secondary was allowing only 94 yards passing per game going into a second-round visit but the main concern with Leyden was star running back Jermaine Shaw. The Eagles had been a power in the 1960s and ‘70s under Jack Leese, winning a state title in his final year as coach in 1977, but they were making their first postseason trip since 1979.
Barrington overcame 3 turnovers and 2 botched punts and led by 14 points as Sagehorn threw 2 TDs to Meyer and Derickson and Preston Villers ran for a score. Leyden came up empty on two fourth-quarter possessions inside the Broncos’ 20 but hung in as Shaw’s touchdown with 46 seconds left cut the lead to 21-20.
Leyden coach George Duffey didn’t like the idea of trading possessions in overtime. He would be proven right a couple of weeks later.
“A tie was not the best thing for us to do,” Duffey said. “They’re too potent on offense. To go 4 downs from the 10, I think would have been a problem.”
It was also no secret Shaw was getting the ball. Derickson, Butera, Garms, Blake Holcomb and Dan Driscoll helped stand up Shaw and force a fumble near the goal line that the Broncos recovered.
“If I was the coach of their team I would have done the same thing,” Derickson said after recovering the onside kick. “Everyone jumped up and started screaming. It’s a feeling I’ll never forget.”
At 11-0, Barrington had matched the 1974 semifinalist for the most wins in school history.
“Our character showed tonight,” Kamradt said.
”When we had to, we stepped up and stopped them like a championship team does,” Butera said.
The Broncos would have to do it again in a much different manner against the defending state champions the following week.
Finding a Way
Lincoln-Way had been the wrong way for MSL teams to go in the playoffs. In 1996, Conant lost 32-12 the second round and unbeaten Palatine got rocked 41-6 in the semifinals. Barrington’s season ended in New Lenox in 1997 and Conant lost its 1998 first-round game there 27-21.
In the days before social media, there was still good old-fashioned “bulletin-board material” for external motivation. And after a 41-14 victory, Sagehorn showed a reporter a story from another paper where a Lincoln-Way player said he wasn’t impressed by the MSL West.
It looked as if it would be more of the same when defending 6A state champion Lincoln-Way was 6 yards from opening a 21-0 lead.
“If they get one more score it’s over,” Kamradt said.
The Knights didn’t as Garms broke up a pass and consecutive sacks by Matt DeGutes and Pete DeBord ended the threat.
“That really turned it around,” DeGutes said.
“Plays like that open up the game for us,” DeBord said. “It tells us we can win this game and they’re not unstoppable. It was crazy. I never expected it. Against the defending state champions.”
Barrington tied the game 20 seconds before halftime as Sagehorn sandwiched TD passes of 56 and 12 yards around Holcomb’s sack and forced fumble recovered by DeBord. Pohlman rushed for 194 yards and 3 TDs and his 69-yard run on the first play of the second half put the Broncos ahead for good.
“People can talk about how small we are and we can’t do this and can’t do that,” said Pohlman, who was held to 14 yards on 9 carries in the playoff loss to Lincoln-Way a year earlier. “Their hearts are too big. They don’t deserve to have anybody downtalk them.”
Garms also returned an interception for a TD and Butera’s 2 interceptions gave him 8 for the season.
“Everything got rolling. Once we settled down and got a little confidence our guys were just awesome,” Kamradt said. “This was fun. I’m so proud of the composure and poise our guys showed. We could have quit and it would have been a real shame. But they never did and they never will.”
The Broncos’ composure, confidence and determination would be put to the ultimate test in the final step on the road to Normal.
Semi-Crazy Comeback
Barrington’s magical run looked as if it would have a bitter ending on a cold Saturday afternoon at Naperville North. Then Pohlman came to the rescue with a stunning kickoff return for a touchdown and 10-yard touchdown runs in both overtimes for a 34-28 victory.
“He was a stud today,” Sagehorn said. “With his kind of speed, when he gets out there he’s better than anybody I’ve ever seen.”
But it took some quick thinking for the Broncos to get a final chance against a Naperville North team with two future NFL players in safety-receiver Glenn Earl (3 years with Houston Texans) and running back Chris Brown (six years including 1,000-yard season with Tennessee in 2004). Barrington led 13-12 in the fourth quarter when Garms forced a fumble deep in its own territory.
On third down, Sagehorn was under pressure and threw a pass well out of bounds. Sagehorn appeared to be 2 yards outside of his end zone, but the officials ruled an intentional grounding penalty occurred in the end zone for a safety and 14-13 Naperville North lead with 3:25 to play.
“I was kind of mystified by that call,” Kamradt said.
The controversial play looked like it would be the focal point as Naperville North took the free kick and was in position to run out the clock. But Derickson’s best “missed tackle” let a receiver complete a 28-yard trip to the end zone to extend the lead to 21-13 with 51.2 seconds left.
A year earlier, Palatine took a similar gamble in the quarterfinals by giving up a late touchdown at Addison Trail. Yaacov Yisrael, who played at Penn State, returned the kickoff for the tying touchdown, although the result didn’t go the Pirates’ way in overtime.
“I pursued it but it wasn’t one of my best efforts pursuing a tackle,” Derickson said.
“It looked pretty grim there,” Pohlman said. “But coach was right. He said it was good for us.”
The kickoff bounced off the hand of a Barrington upback to Pohlman at the 11. He cut to the left, slipped a couple of tackles and raced down the sideline with the team’s first kick-return touchdown of the season with 33.7 seconds left.
“I never really had any doubt,” tight end Steve Canada said. “I was telling people Pohlman’s going to run this back. I knew he was going to do it and the guys did an exceptional job of blocking downfield.”
Barrington still needed a 2-point conversion to tie the game. Sagehorn found a leaping 6-foot-3 Canada where he wasn’t supposed to be in the pattern in the end zone..
“I was staying in blocking and kind of saw in the back of my eye Sagehorn looking around,” Canada said. “I went off my block and sat there and waited for the ball.”
But overtime suddenly wasn’t guaranteed as Earl caught 3 passes for 58 yards to the Barrington 4. A pass into the end zone went off Earl’s pads when he slipped and a 21-yard field goal attempt with 8.7 seconds left was skulled into the line.
“I’ve never, ever been in a game like this,” Tom Burton said. “To tell you the truth, I was kind of dreading (overtime), but whatever we had to do.”
Now fans saw why Leyden’s Duffey went for the regulation win in the second round as Pohlman scored on a 10-yard run but Naperville North tied it in the first overtime. Barrington ended up being outgained 404-172, but the defense stepped up when the Huskies started the second overtime on offense. Burton, Brian Niven and DeBord combined for 2 stops for just 4 total yards and Holcomb, Driscoll and Tom Spicer forced 2 incomplete passes.
Pohlman then completed a game-winning 10-yard touchdown run, which he called “the longest and greatest moment of my life,” when he dived inside the right pylon.
“We pulled it off. I don’t know how we did it but it’s unbelievable,” Burton said.
“The guys on our team just wanted this so badly,” Pohlman said. “You couldn’t write a better script to go to a state championship. That’s been the story of our season. Close calls and perseverance.”
Getting an Air-Full at State
Barrington had seen some potent passing attacks through the years in the MSL from Buffalo Grove, Palatine and Schaumburg. Just a year earlier, the Broncos won a wild 42-39 shootout at Schaumburg where future Illinois standout and NFL quarterback Kurt Kittner threw for 456 yards, which ranked fifth in state history at the time.
But no one had seen anything like what unbeaten Wheaton Warrenville South coach John Thorne had put together with the future Big Ten trio of quarterback Jon Beutjer and top receivers Jon Schweighardt and Eric McGoey. Thorne had used an option attack to win three titles in the previous six years, but in the offseason he switched to a high-octane one-back, four-receiver set.
One of the greatest teams in state history piled up 611 total yards in a 42-14 victory as Beutjer, who played at Iowa and Illinois and now coaches at Lyons Township, threw for 490 yards and 6 TDs against a Barrington secondary that had allowed only 2 TDs all season. Beutjer finished with a national high school record of 60 TDs in a season. McGoey (Illinois) caught 13 passes for 246 yards and 4 TDs and Schweighardt caught 13 for 149 and two scores.
“At halftime it seemed like our guys got kind of shellshocked,” Sanchez said of trailing 28-7. “We were a little tentative. But I’m real proud of the entire team and the defensive group.
“They’re a great team and I think we’re a great team. We have nothing to hang our heads about.”
Sagehorn hit Derickson for a TD late in the first half and Brandon Watts returned a fumble 43 yards for the game’s final score with 1:49 to play. Garms had an interception that was only the 7th of the season for Beutjer.
“The thing that made this team what it was, was it’s closeness,” Kamradt said. “We had great character people. The unity and closeness really made them what they were this year.”
Derickson would captain the Herald All-Area team with Fremd’s Patrick Brown. Pohlman, Butera, Meyer, Sagehorn and DeBord would also earn all-area honors with Dave and Tom Burton and Spicer receiving special mention and Garms and Niven earning honorable mention.
Pohlman, who played football and baseball at Northwestern and minor league baseball, returned to his alma mater to teach and become an assistant for Sanchez. When Kamradt retired after the 2001 season, Barrington quickly turned to Sanchez and this year he became the winningest coach in MSL history with a 162-68 record.
Sagehorn went to Miami (Ohio) and became an accomplished long snapper for a program that had a pretty good quarterback in Ben Roethlisberger. Derickson played at Butler and is in his second year as the associate head coach, special teams coordinator and wide receivers coach at Eastern Illinois. He has also had coaching stops at Western Michigan, Elmhurst, University of Chicago and Alleghany College.
“We really set a standard for new kids coming into the school,” Derickson said.
One of excellence and excitement unlike any other Barrington football had seen in 1998.
That was a great team!