Hilltoppers Hope to Bring Justice On Wheaton Warrenville South

Of the players who’ll be competing in Sunday morning’s clash of DuPage football titans at Wheaton Warrenville South, no one arguably has a more unique perspective on this matchup than Glenbard West quarterback Justice Odom.

Odom once sat in Wheaton Warrenville South High School classrooms as a student. On the gridiron, he started at quarterback for the Tigers’ freshman and sophomore teams. Interestingly, Odom was a late-season call-up to the Tigers’ 2009 varsity squad—the one that handed Glenbard West a heart-breaking defeat in the Class 7A championship game.

But Odom ended up moving to Glen Ellyn during the second semester of his sophomore year to help his ailing grandmother—and transferring to Glenbard West, where his family’s lineage runs deep.

When Odom joined the football team, he became the sixth member of his family to wear a Glenbard West Hitters uniform. His father, Ray, and Ray’s four brothers played for the Hilltoppers in the 1970s. Odom’s older brother, Theo, was an all-state defensive lineman who helped Glenbard West’s 2008 team reach the state semifinals.   

Hilltoppers’ coach Chad Hetlet put Odom’s speed and athleticism right to work last season. Odom started at defensive back, saw spot duty at wideout and even took some snaps as a backup quarterback for the Hilltoppers, who made the playoffs for the fourth straight year. But once again, Glenbard West ran into a Wheaton Warrenville South that was on a roll going into the two teams’ contest.

Their 40-20 loss to the Tigers didn’t sit well with either Odom or his teammates.

“To be honest, right after we lost last year’s game, that’s right when I started thinking about it (playing WWS again),” Odom said. “The feeling that I got was terrible. I never want it to happen again. I know that my teammates also feel the same way. They thought the same thing as they were walking off the field.”

The graduation of Glenbard West’s two senior quarterbacks, Mike Matthew and Daver Glawe, left the Hilltoppers with a vacancy at QB for 2011.

Enter Justice Odom.

Odom fits right in to Glenbard West’s run-over-opponents-and-ask-questions-later offense. What he’s shown Hetlet during 7-on-7 competitions over the summer is that he can throw the ball, too—thus giving the Hilltoppers more options offensively.

“I think with his ability to run and throw and read and be an option quarterback, it allows us to do more with what we do offensively,” Hetlet told ESPNChicago.com. “We’ve always been a traditional kind of pound-the-ball, play-action type of offense. We’re not saying we’re not that team, but we’re going to be a team that can spread you out with our athletes who have speed and our quarterback. 

“For what we do, he’s going to put the ball where we need it.”

Odom is hoping he and the Hilltoppers put the ball across Wheaton Warrenville South’s goal line often enough on Sunday to help put two years of frustrating, season-ending losses behind them.

The game has constantly been on Odom’s mind, “Almost to the point of craziness.”

“I’ve just been thinking about it, thinking about it, thinking about it,” he said. “Lost sleep thinking about it.”

Although Odom says it would be personally satisfying to beat his old team, he insists he has no axe to grind with Wheaton Warrenville South.

“As a competitor, I try not to take anything personal,” he said. “I play my game the way I should and the way I need to. But does it mean something greater than it does to my teammates? It’s hard to say because I know to my teammates it (beating WWS) means a lot.

“But I would say that my want and desire to win could be greater than most because I went there. It’s not something personal.”

The way in which Glenbard West has gone about its business this week—focusing on the task at hand despite an avalanche of publicity and buildup surrounding the game—is something Hetlet hopes will pay dividends come Sunday.

“It’s a little more hype than a normal week,” he said, “but I really feel like our eye is on the prize. The kids aren’t talking about all the other side things and distractions.

“We want to beat Wheaton South. Until we beat them, we’re not going to be where they’re at. There’s a lot of teams to be played (yet this season), but this is big. You don’t get to play one of the best teams in the state right out of the gate. It’s a good proving ground for us.”

“Everyone’s really excited,” added senior offensive tackle Johnny Caspers, who’s beginning his third season as a varsity starter. “We’ve been waiting for this game for a while now. We preach one game at a time, and this has been our one game since December. We’re pretty focused on it and our energy has been really high.”