I don’t know if North Rockland is good enough to win Section 1 AA football this year, don’t even know if the Red Raiders are good enough to get to the finals in Mahopac.

But it sure looks like they’ll be the usual tough out in these playoffs, sure looks like a team nobody really wants to play.

And this year’s edition is different. North Rockland usually is one of those power Section 1 teams who run, run, run and play good defense, with big guys on both sides of the ball.

But the 2007 Red Raiders are smaller and quicker and they throw it. They’re not mad bombers, mind you, but they run a four-wide offense and they run it pretty well, behind a junior quarterback, Mike Fasano.

The 7-1 Red Raiders — who have never missed the postseason in coach Joe Casarella’s 27 seasons as coach, and who have 14 Section 1 titles since moving over from Section 9, 24 seasons ago — knocked out Carmel 33-14 in the Class AA quarterfinals today. They just did it in a different way.

The thing about Carmel is, well, it throws the ball, too. almost exclusively. It made for a long, but very entertaining afternoon on North Rockland’s manicured natural-grass field, which a day earlier was under water and caused a postponement. Is there a better real-grass field in Section 1?

The Rams, who came in 6-1, had a sophomore, Ryan Shilling, flinging it from the no-huddle, and from the shotgun. Shilling did not hand off the ball, not even once, until the final minute of the game. He either ran it himself, or it was in the air. And thus, the Rams were right in the game until the very end.

This No. Rock team is different than, certainly, the ‘06 team, not only in its makeup and the way it plays, but also because of the way it has won.

The Red Raiders opened the season against Section 9’s Monroe Woodbury, which only won the state championship in 2005 and lost the state championship game by a point in overtime in 2006 and is favored to go back to the Dome again in ‘07. Monroe had an extra week of preparation and a game already under its belt when it beat the Raiders 31-10. North Rockland then won seven in a row, one of them by 17-16 over Clarkstown South, their semifinal opponent; one by 3-0 over Poughkeepsie last week, allowing just seven touchdowns in the winning streak.

“A lot of fourth-quarter tight games,� Fasano said. “That just shows that we come out and we’re ready to play, but in the fourth quarter, when it’s buckle-down time, we do what we have to do to win the game.�

Whatever it takes, especially at this time of year.

“We live for this,� big-hearted running back Chris Landry said. “When this time comes, we just never let down. Everything’s put out onto the field.�

In the last four years, North Rockland is the only team to beat New Rochelle in the Section 1 playoffs (in 2005, when it went on to win the title) and the other three seasons New Rochelle ended North Rockland’s season in the playoffs on the way to its championships. They have ended each other’s seasons in five of the last seven years.