Alexzandria Richardson wanted to set the tone early for St. Charles North.

So when she got the first snap of the game against Wheaton North directly to her, the junior tailback was ready to do whatever she could to find the open gap.

And once she did, there was no catching up to her.

Richardson’s 86-yard touchdown to start the game opened the flood gates, as the North Stars went on to take a 43-14 victory over the Falcons on Monday.

“We went to this knowing exactly what we wanted to do,” Richardson said. “I thank my screeners a lot on that first play. Without them I wouldn’t have been able to run how I did. We were just excited from the beginning and just continued to feed off of it.”

Richardson finished the game with 209 rushing yards off of just five carries, and added rushing touchdowns from 85 and 32 yards out in the contest. In total, the North Stars finished the night with 325 yards on the ground, with sophomore Emma West also having a 48-yard rushing score on the night.

“She (Richardson) truly is special at the end of the day,” North Stars coach Michael Taormina said. “She’s got passion for this game, passion for this team, and we’re not afraid to give it to her at any point in time. We feel that when we put her on the field, we have one of the best players on the field.”

That early success on offense was quickly translated over to the defense for the North Stars (8-1 overall, 3-0 DuKane). On their first defensive drive, junior Kaelie Tomalak got in front of a pass for the first of five interceptions for SCN, taking it 35 yards into the end zone for a pick-six.

“That was just really fun,” Tomalak said. “I think it brought all of the energy up and it fed into the rest of the plays throughout the game. And I mean, Zandria got me going with her 86-yard touchdown. It just got me so fired up.”

Tomalak also finished the night with three touchdowns, coming in a variety of ways. The junior also had a 17-yard touchdown reception off a pass from junior Olivia Taormina (3-for-5 for 39 yards), while also tossing a 24-yard score to junior Jillian Salter.

“It was all about executing the plan, which we were able to do here,” Michael Taormina said. “This is still so new to them, and they’re still learning at the end of the day. Small wins on the field like that translate big time as we move down each game. They know that they’re going to face adversity at some point in time, and all of these moments that they are learning here, it’s definitely going to help them down the line.”

For Wheaton North (6-2, 2-1), they were never fully able to catch up to the North Stars’ offense. Senior Brea Moore (33 rushing yards, 29 receiving yards) put the Falcons on the board with a four-yard reception touchdown in the second quarter, and junior Emily Macek had a 20-yard receiving touchdown as the clock wound down.

“We just faced a little adversity tonight and we just couldn’t come back from it,” Falcons coach Will Kadera said. “It’s a great learning point. We’re still figuring things out and have a great group of kids. We’ve just got to make sure that we flush this thing and go back to practice to fix some things.”