North Central's Jordan Dean by Steve Frommell, d3photography.com; Wheaton's Jesse Geary by Michael Hudson Photography

Even Wheaton coach Mike Swider cannot deny that Saturday's home game matching his No. 17 Thunder against No. 12 North Central is not just another game.

"It's a big game," said Wheaton's veteran coach of the annual Little Brass Bell game against the suburban Chicago rivals who are close enough to each other to take public transportation to the contest, or ride bicycles. "I'd be lying to you to say that it's not. We're normally both at the top of the conference and normally both ranked. This is the fun part of the game. We have a lot of respect for North Central and this is the reason why you sign up for it."

The meaning of the Little Brass Bell game has not changed much over the years. It still will have a major impact on who will win the CCIW. The winner is essentially guaranteed a spot in the Division III playoffs while the loser is not.

The teams have split the Little Brass Bell games the past two years, with Wheaton winning in 2012 and North Central last year. But that 2012 Wheaton team had the rarity of winning the Little Brass Bell game not making the playoffs, with the selection committee passing on the Thunder, which had two losses that season.

The Thunder have not made the playoffs since 2010, despite winning at least eight games in each of those season.

"I try not to get bent out of shape about it," Swider said. "Sometimes you get frustrated that 8-2 doesn't get you in. Sometimes one loss might keep you out. I tell our players, the bottom line is that it is about playing football, and the verb is playing. In games like this, the team that plays the best wins. So if we play the best, all those other things will tend to take of themselves."

Wheaton, 6-0 and 3-0 in the CCIW finds itself ranked No. 17 behind once-beaten North Central (5-1, 3-0). When the conversation, turns to the Thunder, the conversation often turns to Wheaton's lack of style points in their wins – such as its 20-13 win against 2-4 Augustana and its 17-0 win against winless UW-Eau Claire. Many think those are teams that on paper the Thunder should have crushed.

Swider, though, said he tends not to listen to such talk – or any talk at all except about his opponents the week they are getting ready to play them because if they are not on his schedule, it does not help the Thunder win football games.

"This is not condemnation against people who write articles, but I don't have a computer at home," Swider said. "I don't read newspapers. Our SID tells me where we're ranked and the players will get into that stuff but I just don't. All it is are opinions. You are who you are and we are 6-0 right now, so it doesn't matter. We're trying to win the conference and get into the playoffs, but I don't know about style points or anything like that, so it's all good."

The Thunder have hung their hat on defense most of the season. Wheaton is surrendering an average of less than two touchdowns a game, In fact, its defense has not given up a point in the first quarter and only 29 points in the entire first half, allowing the offense time to get on track and take early leads. That would come in handy against a North Central team that's accustomed to playing with the lead.

Led by the linebacking corps of Adam Dansdill (88 tackles 38 solos), the coach's son Mikey Swider (60 tackles, 30 solos) and Caleb Ashby (41 tackles, 35 solos), Wheaton crew works on keeping the score down for its offensive.

"There's no question that our offense has sputtered at times and we've had to lean on our defense," Swider said. "We've had to depend on our defense several times this season but we're a team so I know there's going to come a time where we're going to have to depend on our offense. That will happen as well, but no doubt we have played very good defense this season. Dansdill is having a very big year and all of our linebackers are playing really well."

Offensively, Wheaton tries to strike a balance with quarterback Reece Butler who is completing 63.7 percent of his passes this season (86-135-3 for 1,040 yards, seven touchdowns) and its running game supported by Jesse Geary (69.8 yards per game, 4.0 yards per carry) and Danny Puknaitis (36.0 yards per game, 4.8 yards per carry).

"When you have the ability to run the football you're going to have a pretty good shot to win the game," Swider said. "We want to always do better running the ball but I'm happy at where we are right now. I think we want to strike a balance as an offense because if you're one dimensional, it makes it easier for teams to beat you."

Swider said that he hopes Wheaton has played well enough this season that the Little Brass Bell game won't be the determining factor of whether it gets into the playoffs or not but added the one way the Thunder can get into the post season for sure is by beating its rival North Central and winning the CCIW title.

Damaschke, Wenzelburger pile up frequent flyer miles

The quarterback-receiver duo of Austin Damaschke and Garrett Wenzelburger at Concordia (Wis.) may have finally outdone themselves in a 49-46 win over Trine. Damaschke completed 41 of 73 attempts (yes, his arm is still attached to his body) for a school and NACC record 490 yards. He threw for four touchdowns and ran for two more in the wild victory.

Wenzelburger broke the conference record with 14 receptions while compiling 210 yards on the day. His 3,116 career receiving yards are just 76 yards off the school career mark and 418 off the conference mark with four games to go.

The Falcons are now 4-2 as Damaschke now leads the nation in passing yards per game with a 416.2 yards per contest average followed by Rose-Hulman's Austin Swenson at 383.3 yards a game. Wenzelburger is second on nation in receiving yards per game with 159.5 yards a contest.

Game of the Week

Rose-Hulman (5-1, 3-1) at Franklin (5-2, 5-0), 1:30 p.m. – After opening season 0-2 and struggling the beat Manchester, everyone had their doubts about Franklin. Someone forgot to tell the Grizzlies. Now after dispatching Mount St. Joseph on the road last week 38-28, Franklin could set it set up to win yet another crown by beating the team it shared the HCAC title with last year in Rose-Hulman. The Fightin’ Engineers enter the game, though, with one of the nation's best passing attacks triggered by Swenson. After the loss to Bluffton, it will be Rose-Hulman's truest test to see if it's ready to take the next step into represent the HCAC in the playoffs.