By Ed Muniz
**Our SIncere Apologies for the lack of quality photos for this game. Just All Sports will again cover the WNFL Lightweights on September 4 to provide the full experience. **
Oland Park-The Orland Park Pioneers were back on the football field at Sandburg High School on August 28.
The second week schedule of the Wednesday Night Football League saw them hosting three mid-week games with visitors from the New Lenox Jr. Knights the opponent at Super Lightweight, Lightweight and Varsity divisions
The WNFL is composed of teams made up of players that see limited time during the regular season games on weekends due to inexperience or talent in a learning and developmental stage. They play against others on teams of similar levels of football experience.
Back before 2016, the Pioneers would participate in a Wednesday night scrimmage event the Frankfort program ran, it was a simple scrimmage in a corner of a field of some 20 yards.
Parents weren’t real fond of it as at times, they’d play in weeds with car headlights providing the illumination.
In 2016, heads of the Orland Park Pioneers, New Lenox Jr Warriors and the Homer Stallions got together and formed mostly what is seen now. 100-yard fields, referees, scores, playoffs and a championship of the WNFL at each level
SLW, LW and JV had championships, the Varsity level didn’t participate in the first year, not all programs had enough players at the varsity level, and the teams from Frankfort Falcons chose not to participate in the playoffs.
Today, because of the development of the WNFL, kids that began in it and honed their skills in it, have gone on to start at various High School programs and gone on to play at levels beyond.
What was once a sole learning and developmental league is now quite competitive, loaded with talent.
For the host Pioneers, SLW and LW were playing in the second game of the season while Varsity was playing in its first.
This evening turned out to be a successful one for the Pioneers, with all three teams winning at home.
Up first was the Lightweight Pioneers.
With Bennett Brown leading the offense from the Quarterback position and a speedy Michale Ordman at running back, while also a display of stellar defense by Christian Paulson, the Pioneers managed to keep the Falcons scoreless while adding a touchdown for the 6-0 victory.
Early on, the offenses were trying to get out of their own way as defenses were dominating play for both.
The Pioneers did catch the first break when Cody Godlewski made back-to-back tackles and recovered a fumble on the second.
Brown, Ordman and Adam Krokos moved the ball, but it was back and forth; gain a yard, lose a yard, eventually surrendering the football on downs to start the second quarter.
The Pioneers defense didn’t mind heading back on the field. For them it was just routine in stopping whatever the Jr. Knights attempted to do. Run Right, run left, run up the middle, didn’t matter, the Pioneers defense wasn’t allowing much behind the tackling of Scott Gumienny, Tyler Wilke and Paulson.
When the ball came back to the Pioneers offense, three straight runs produced 10 yards by Bradley Patterson and Adam Krokos. On the next play, Brown dropped back and completed a pass to Ordman who raced 22 yards.
After a 3-yard burst by Patterson, Ordman took a handoff and got to the left edge, out running the defense and scoring a touchdown from 14-yards out with 1:37 left in the first half of a running clock.
“It was a really good play,” said Ordman, “Good blocking, Adam (Krokos) and Caden (Kolodziej) threw a really good blocks at the corner and beyond, I just had to get up field and score.”
With the 6-0 lead heading into half, the Pioneers were feeling confident with the hard, tough defense they brought this evening.
The first five series of the second half saw the teams exchanging punts back and forth. For the Pioneers, the defense was still as solid as it was in the first half, giving next to nothing behind the tackling of Paulson, Ordman, Caden Kolodziej, Thomas Sutter, Brown, Krokos and Gumienny.
Paulson came to play and showed it, leading the team in tackles.
“I was blitzing and following the ball,” said Paulson. “Our defense really was getting to the ball and making tackles. The hardest part of our defense is knowing how much time you have to call or when to move. That was a very good team. Shows we are a pretty good team holding it together.”
Scott Gumienny also had a good defensive game. he complemented the play of Paulson with several tackles of his own.
“I was getting off the ball really fast,” said Scott. “I was shedding the guy blocking me a lot, I’d grab his pad and throw him to the side most of the game. I should get in the backfield more and not jump off sides; I need to work on that.”
Most of the second half, the Pioneer offense was misfiring, just unable to put sets of plays together for positive yards. A late fourth quarter drive was promising after Brown completed a pass to Sutter for 11 yards, but soon after, Brown was intercepted to end the drive.
The Pioneers defense would be tested one last time as the game clock was winding down.
The Jr. Knights completed a long pass that got them downfield quickly, every play got them closer and closer to possibly winning the game as time was about to expire. Desperately trying to even the game and maybe even win it, the Jr. Knights tried another pass, but an opportunistic Adam Krokos sealed the win for the Pioneers with his interception to the delight of his teammates, coaches and crowd.
Others cheering on their teammates or contributing to the winning effort were Gunner McCarthy, Keith Piekarz, Joey Zotto, Will Poore, Cole Baldridge, Jackson Biskup, Ryan Lukas, Jase Enstrom, Vito Cangelosi, Carter and Jason Erwin, Mike Oconnor, Lucca Morandi, Noah Cordoba, Chris Medina Jr., Andrew Richardson, Brooks Foster, Blake Nance, Laith Hammami, Dominic Gabriele, Nick Pomonis, Yousef Yasin, Samuel Horeluk, James Okrasinski, Dominic Lach, Collin Valan, Jimmy Elsberg, Connor Kvelland, Michael Galivan, Jude Morrar, Rayder Slabenak and Owen Garrity.
