Written By
Written By
Written By
Written By
These two programs have played 106 times and never in a game like this one.
No. 1 North Central (4-0, 2-0 CCIW) hosts No. 2 Wheaton (5-0, 3-0) at 6 p.m. CT Saturday at Benedetti-Wehrli Stadium in Naperville, Ill., in the D3football.com Top 25's top matchup. It's the 107th meeting between the schools and the 77th for the Little Brass Bell. It's the highest-ranked meeting in the rivalry's history, and as the Daily Herald's Paul Johnson notes, the two have never before met as the country's top two teams.
It's also North Central's homecoming. D1 Rejects is bringing its "Small School Saturday" pregame show to campus from 9 to 11:30 a.m., and the show will stream on D1 Rejects' YouTube channel, X, Facebook and FloCollege.
North Central received 24 of 25 first-place votes in this week's D3football.com poll and 624 points. Wheaton jumped from No. 3 to No. 2 with 567 points after a 33-6 homecoming win over North Park. St. John's, No. 3, took the other first-place vote.
North Central has been No. 1 in every D3football.com poll this season, preseason included.
The Cardinals have already beaten two ranked teams in nonconference play: Bethel, then No. 2, and No. 9 Wartburg. They followed that with a 35-7 home win over receiving-votes Augustana. North Central has won 53 straight CCIW games, the longest streak in conference history.
Last season ended one game short. North Central went 14-1, hosted every playoff game through the semifinals, and lost 24-14 to UW-River Falls in the Stagg Bowl on Jan. 4. According to the Daily Herald, the Cardinals have played in each of the past six Stagg Bowls and won three of them.
The Bell has been all North Central lately. The Cardinals won 35-0 in Naperville last Oct. 4 and, according to the Wheaton Sentinel, have won five straight in the series. Wheaton still leads the all-time series 55-48-3, per the Sentinel.
Fifth-year receiver Jack Rummell, the team's second-leading receiver with 18 catches for 327 yards and three touchdowns, told the Daily Herald he came back for games like this one.
"We circled it on the calendar for a long time," Rummell said. "Now being No. 1 versus No. 2, it has more meaning behind it."
Wheaton opened the season by beating then-No. 3 Mount Union 24-23 on Sept. 5. The Wheaton Sentinel reports that the win snapped the Purple Raiders' 85-game regular-season winning streak. The Thunder were No. 2 in the D3football.com poll after Week 1, slipped behind defending national champion UW-River Falls in mid-September, and moved back up after UW-River Falls lost.
This isn't a one-year bump. Wheaton went 11-3 in 2025 and reached the Division III quarterfinals, where it lost at UW-River Falls. The Thunder started this season No. 5 in the D3football.com preseason poll, their highest preseason ranking since 2021.
The defense is the calling card. Wheaton held North Park to 148 total yards and 20 rushing yards. Junior linebacker Zeke Harris, a D3football.com preseason All-American who led the CCIW with 119 tackles last season, had 11 tackles and a sack and was named CCIW Defensive Student-Athlete of the Week, the Sentinel reported.
Both head coaches played for the school they now coach, and both told the Daily Herald they're trying to keep the hype away from their players.
"Every year the game matters a lot," Wheaton's Jesse Scott said. "When I talk in the recruiting process and talk about the games you're going to play in, my contention is that this is the best game every year."
North Central's Brad Spencer said the No. 1 vs. No. 2 billing changes the game more for the fans than for the team.
"Regardless of rankings and records, it's Wheaton," Spencer said. "They're super talented and super well-coached, and that never really changes regardless of the rankings."
The winner takes the lead in the CCIW, which has run through Naperville for years, and holds the top spot heading into the second half of the season. For Wheaton, a win would end North Central's 53-game league streak and the Cardinals' five-game Bell streak on the same night. For North Central, it's a chance to keep the path to a seventh straight Stagg Bowl running through Benedetti-Wehrli Stadium.
