AURORA, Ill. – The Rockford University football team concluded its season on Saturday at rival Aurora University. The Spartans and Regents played a highly competitive opening half before Aurora took control in the second half outscoring the Regents 28-0 for the 44-7 win.
Rockford was able to move the ball on offense but had a few unlucky bounces early that kept the Regents from taking control of the game. After receiving the opening kickoff, Rockford was driving the ball down the field when the Spartans intercepted a pass that rolled off the back of a receiver and returned it 60 yards for a touchdown. The Regents did not get down on themselves and answered right back on their very next possession. Senior quarterback Aabed Nekrawesh (Fremont, Calif./Fremont) led his team on an 8-play 75-yard touchdown drive to knot the game at 7-7. Nekrawesh was 4-5 on the drive with 52 yards passing before handing the ball off to Seth Swinehart (Rockford, Ill./East) for a 1-yard touchdown run. Following an Aurora field goal, the Rockford offense once again was marching the ball down the field deep into Aurora territory. However, the Regents were unable to come away with points after being sacked on first down and then missing a 28-yard field goal keeping it a 10-7 Aurora lead. The opportunistic Spartans tacked on another touchdown later in the second quarter to take a 16-7 lead into halftime.
Aurora began the second half as it did the first scoring a touchdown the first time it touched the ball to extend the lead to 23-7. Nekrawesh then once again marched the Regents down the field hitting on his first three attempts including a 56-yard completion to Anastacio Zamba (Berkeley, Calif./Berkeley) putting the ball first and goal at the Aurora 5-yard line. From there the Regents got a total of 10 plays to try and punch the ball into the end zone including 6 plays from the Aurora 1-yard line but were turned away each time. The Spartans offense then capitalized on their defense's amazing goal line stand driving 99 yards for a touchdown. Aurora scored twice more in the fourth quarter to seal the 44-7 victory.
Offensively it was a frustrating game for Regents as they were able to move the ball up and down the field for much of the afternoon but simply could not find end zone. Nekrawesh finished the game with 22 completions for 256 yards through the air. Tight end Dane Kirk (Rochelle, Ill./Rochelle) caught a game-high 8 passes for 58 yards while senior wide receiver Anastacio Zamba caught 6 passes for a team-high 102 yards. Fellow senior wide receivers Delroy Russell Jr. (Richmond, Calif./Albany) and Rob Toth (Huntington Beach, Calif./Edison) caught 5 passes for 53 yards and 4 passes for 43 yards respectively.
Junior Seth Swinehart and senior Jinks Arnold (Romeoville, Ill./Plainfield North) led the Regents defensively. Swinehart finished with a game-high 8 tackles and a sack. Arnold made 7 solo tackles including Rockford's other sack and had the team's lone pass breakup.
The Rockford University football team finishes its season with an overall record of 1-9 and a 0-6 record in the Northern Athletics Collegiate Conference.
