Senior receiver Braden Harms can be counted on in all situations for St. Charles North.
While Harms ranks second on the team in catches behind Northwestern recruit Keaton Reinke, his intangibles have helped the North Stars reach the second round of the Class 7A playoffs.
“Braden is a field general,” St. Charles North coach Rob Pomazak said. “He’s just like Steady Eddie. He knows everything. He’s got one of the highest football IQ’s on the team.
“We can play him on defense. He runs his routes. He knows everybody’s assignments. I always call him the linchpin. Braden is one of the main reasons why we’ve had so much success.”
Harms put in the work to get to this point, so hearing that high praise made him happy.
“It’s awesome,” Harms said. “The coaching staff has so much trust in me and faith in me, and I can’t thank them enough for all they’ve done for me.”
The past two weeks, with Reinke out with an illness, Harms has been getting the job done at receiver for St. Charles North (9-1) along with junior Chris Akpede and senior EJ Mondesir.
Harms had three catches for 92 yards and a TD as the North Stars rolled to a 42-12 win over East Moline United and advanced to a 7 p.m. Saturday second-round game against Carmel (8-2), which also features a future Big Ten player in Nebraska-bound junior quarterback Trae Taylor.
Harms and Co. took advantage of last week’s opportunity, much to the delight of Reinke.
“Seeing the success is great because I knew we had the guys this year,” Reinke said. “These past couple weeks showed that anyone can be the dude.”
While Harms enjoyed being the No. 1 receiver, having Reinke back is just fine with him.
“Obviously, I love having ‘Keto’ on the field as much as possible,” Harms said. “He takes a lot of pressure off of everyone.
“I think these last two weeks have been great to show how many weapons we have on this offense. We’re all playmakers able to do something with the rock in our hands.”
It does make it easier with Reinke out there attracting defensive attention, though.
“He’ll be killing it and doing his thing, and once they realize, ‘OK, he can make plays,’ they start to forget about me and the other receivers,” Harms said. “He takes a lot of the attention.”
Pomazak understood coming into the season that this group of receivers would be one of the strengths of the team. That has turned out exactly to be the case.
“We had the last two weeks where (Reinke) wasn’t out there and they handled it extremely well,” Pomazak said. “It just changed where the focus was. They stepped up.
“It’s nice having ‘Keto’ out there because you know where the spotlight is going to be. If you have other guys that are better than the average player, it really becomes a shell game for defenses.”
Reinke is good to go for this weekend, according to Pomazak. That’s a big boost for the North Stars since they have to deal with one of the best quarterbacks in the state.
Taylor has delivered a monster season for Carmel, throwing for 3,302 yards and 36 TDs with only three interceptions. He’s also rushed for 505 yards and 10 TDs.
“He’s back and he’s full tilt,” Pomazak said of Reinke. “He’ll touch the ball a ton. There will be two Big Ten football players out there.
“If their guy is going to touch the ball 70 times, our guy has to touch it quite a bit too.”
Potential for snow exists Saturday, but Harms confirmed that won’t change anything.
“It’s going to be a very fun game, very competitive,” Harms said. “We’re going to come out and do our thing. The game plan is not going to change. We’re going to come out here and go ball.”
Paul Johnson is a freelance reporter for The Beacon-News.
