by Roy Taylor, Sun Correspondent

Glenbard South coach Dan Starkey tells his team that they should look at the season as a game consisting of three periods, with each period made up of three games.

In his estimation, the team ended the first period with a record of 1-2, and started the second period 1-0 with their win at Plainfield South on Sept. 17.

The Raiders (3-2, 1-0 Suburban Prairie North) are now 2-0 in the second period of Starkey's first season after beating host Sycamore (3-2, 0-1) 25-14 at Engh Community Field on Sept. 24.

Second periods seem to be good for Starkey's team.

Against Sycamore in the second quarter, the Raiders scored twotouchdowns, recovered a fumble and blocked a punt. South's strong performance in the first half gave the Raiders a 19-0 lead at intermission.

Sycamore lost three fumbles on the evening, all of which led to Raiders touchdowns.

Quarterback Josh Plachy led the South offensive charge by rushing for 119 yards on 18 carries, and also passing for 70 yards on four completions. On a 14-yard touchdown pass to wide receiver Tom Snyder in the fourth quarter, Plachy showed tremendous touch as he lofted a perfect throw over the outstretched arms of a Sycamore defender.

"We ran the ball pretty well at them in the first half, so at halftime we decided we wanted to throw the ball a little more," Plachy said. "In the second half, they started pulling their safeties up, which left the middle of the field wide open.

"They forced us to throw the ball, and we got it done."

After receiving the opening kickoff, South held the ball for four minutes and drove 45 yards until they were stopped on fourth-and-9 from the Sycamore 29. The Spartans then responded, driving to the South 23 when they gave up their first fumble.

Jim Skupien recovered, and after a 71-yard drive, Pat Torralba scored a touchdown on a 2-yard run.

Sycamore next drove as far as the Raiders 12, when on fourth-and-3, South defenders Kevin Mercado and Stan Bazigos broke up a potential Spartans touchdown pass at the goal line.

On the first play of Sycamore's next series, running back William Loptien gave up the Spartans' second fumble on his own 36.

Seven plays later, Plachy scored on a 27-yard bootleg.

With 2:35 remaining in the second quarter, South's defense held Sycamore to 1 yard on three plays.

As Justin Evans swung his leg to punt on fourth-and-9, defensive tackle Spyro Bazigos rushed in to block the kick, which was returned 10 yards for a touchdown by running back Mikah Anderson.

To open the second half, Sycamore engineered a 16-play, 75-yard drive for a touchdown that took almost eight minutes off the clock.

Running back Adam Crouch rushed for 65 yards himself, capping the drive with a 5-yard score.

Following the kickoff, South faced a third-and-10 from their own 32, and with Sycamore's crowd back in the game it looked as if the momentum might swing to the home team. Plachy silenced them with an 11-yard gain for a first down, then four plays later completed a 36-yard pass on third-and-25 to Snyder.

Later in the drive, facing a fourth-and-5 from the Spartans 14, Plachy ended the South scoring with his touchdown pass to Snyder.

Despite their punishing scoring drive to open the second half, Sycamore was unable to run the ball on South any further.

They scored once more on a 60-yard pass from Daniel Sabock to Loptien with 13 seconds remaining in the game.

"They had a nice drive to start the second half which ended up in the end zone, but we made some adjustments on the next series and we shut them down pretty good," Starkey said.

The Raiders head coach was pleased with all portions of his game plan in the victory.

"We moved the ball pretty well on them; we only had to punt twice in the first half. The turning point of the game was the blocked punt; we take tremendous pride in blocking punts whenever the opportunity presents itself," he said.

On his defense, Starkey said the commitment was to stop Sycamore's running game at all costs.

"Last week, Plainfield South's running back just lit us up, so we came in with the idea of stopping the run. I think our kids did a pretty good job of doing that. We had three fumble recoveries, and we practice a strip and fumble recovery drill three times a week, so it's been an emphasis for us."

Standing out on special teams and defense were brothers Spyro and Stan Bazigos. In addition to blocking the punt, Spyro Bazigos applied consistent pressure on Sabock, and Stein contributed to the touchdown-saving pass breakup in the second quarter.

"The Bazigos brothers are the two strongest kids in our program, and we depend on them because we have a young team," Sharkey said.

South travels to Geneva tonight.

"They're a heck of a ballclub, and I know their quarterback has put in a lot of work to achieve his goal of making the playoffs this year," Starkey said. "I know it's going to be tough to go and play them there next week. But we're 3-0 on the road this year, so hopefully we can keep that momentum going." If the momentum and Plachy's strong play continues, he may help his coach achieve the season's goal.

"We're really motivated right now," Plachy said. "Our goal this season is to win the conference championship. It would be great for our team and our school. We went after it tonight, and we're going to keep going after it."