A high-spirited Racine Raiders team rode their emotion to a 44-14 Mid-States Football League win over the Illinois Cowboys on July 13, easily avenging their only loss of the season.
“We had a great practice on Wednesday and it carried into tonight,” Raiders coach Wilbert Kennedy told The Journal Times. “We played with a lot of energy, a lot of tempo and had a lot of attitude. I saw fire in guys’ eyes.”
It was a far cry from their first meeting six-weeks earlier, when the visiting Raiders fell 14-12 in Palos Hills as a last second field goal was blocked.
This time, playing at Horlick Field with essentially their entire roster in the fold, including three of their best players who were sidelined by injury in the first meeting, the Raiders left nothing to chance. The Cowboys (3-4, 3-3 MSFL), on the other hand, only had an unofficial count of 24 players dressed for the game, about half the size of the Raiders team, with their coach Kevin Burage lamenting that he was missing almost his entire offensive line.
While racing out to a 30-6 halftime lead, quarterback Mitchell Farr threw touchdown passes to Jordan Payne and Will Norwood, Howard Tripplet scored on a 1–yard run, and cornerback Robert Lewis returned an interception 44 yards for another score, and the Raiders never looked back.
Triplet and Torin Turner capped the scoring for the Raiders with second half scoring runs of 2 and 14 yards.
The Raiders’ game-of-the-year came at a high cost, with cornerback Daquan Smith and running back Austin Tenner both suffering what could be serious injuries.
