MSL to NFL: A Glimpse of Greatness from Rashard Mendenhall
Niles West Retiring Star Running Back's Uniform No. 5 on Friday
When the kid broke outside with the ball and started to cut upfield near the sideline you immediately knew the No. 5 on the back of the jersey was going to get a lot smaller very quickly.
The kid was a sophomore running back named Rashard Mendenhall from Niles West. He had just covered 56 yards in a breakaway run to the north end zone at Mike Basrak Field in a Central Suburban North showdown with Maine West on September 13, 2002.
Maine West coach Ray Pettenuzzo could see what was going to happen, too, as he watched Mendenhall race to the tying score in the fourth quarter. Pettenuzzo was a very good football coach with a great gift for creative perspective in any situation. How many people could make light of their own cancer fight as he did by saying, “I’m hoping (my hair) will come back a little bit so I don’t look like a retired Chippendale’s dancer or Uncle Fester (from the Addams Family)?
So, even after a heartbreaking 30-27 loss on a late drive and touchdown pass with 2.9 seconds left, Pettenuzzo was on top of his game in describing Mendenhall. Pettenuzzo knew when Mendenhall got to the edge and started his turn upfield “the next place he was stopping was Oakton Street (behind the north end zone).”
Mendenhall would finish the game with 136 yards rushing and 122 receiving on 8 catches. Pettenuzzo believed he had a way to stop him.
“I was hoping the Skokie police would come and put a radar gun on him,” Pettenuzzo joked. “I knew he was speeding and I was hoping they would give him a ticket.”
Nobody really devised a speed trap to slow or stop Mendenhall. Not in high school as he rushed for approximately 5,000 yards and became a 5-star recruit. Not in the Big Ten as he won the prestigious Tribune Silver Football Award and led Illinois to the Rose Bowl. And not during a six-year NFL career where he rushed for 4,236 yards and 37 touchdowns with the Steelers and Cardinals.
Fittingly, Niles West is retiring Mendenhall’s No. 5 in a ceremony Friday afternoon in the school gym, which I first saw reported by Kaleb Carter in The CSL Varsity Newsletter. It will be the first football number retired in school history, according to a news release from the school, although four-time Pro Bowl quarterback and 18-year NFL veteran Jim Hart (1966-84) is definitely deserving. Mendenhall will also be recognized during the home football game that evening against district rival Niles North.
Mendenhall was inducted into the Niles West Athletic Hall of Fame in 2015. He was part of the University of Illinois Hall of Fame Class of 2023 honored last weekend that included Kenny Battle of the 1989 “Flyin’ Illini” Final Four team, pitcher Ken Holtzman from the ‘69 Cubs and three-time World Series champion A’s and 1983 Rose Bowl quarterback Jack Trudeau.
“This means everything to be honored at my alma mater and university,” Mendenhall said in a YouTube video from Illini Inquirer: Illinois on 247 Sports. “Seeing the names and pictures on the walls. (Red) Grange, (George) Halas and the great Jim Grabowski. To think that I did that much means a lot.”
Mendenhall retired from the NFL at age 26 and now owns a production company with his wife where they do screenwriting and music writing. He was one of the writers on the HBO series “Ballers” that ran for five seasons.
“When I had the ball in my hands, I was a fast kid and that was the one time nobody could tell me to slow down,” Mendenhall said. “Football was like, ‘No, go. Let loose. Be all of who you are.’
“Football is an expression of who I am and how I feel. Now I can express myself in different ways in writing.”
Rashard Mendenhall expressed himself on the field in a way few high school players could on that night 21 years ago against Maine West.