Jason Casey
For The New Era
Jake Rogers and Junction City’s rushing attack proved hard to slow down for the Huskies Friday night, as they lost on the road to the Tigers 36-27.
Rogers finished the game with 223 rushing yards and three touchdowns.
“There were three outside contain losses, 50 to 60 yards-plus. The second play of the dang game, and that was probably 70 yards,” said Coach Dustin Nichol. “You take three of those away and they get caught in the backfield and it’s a dang ball game.”
The young Husky team had issues wrapping up and bringing down Tiger running backs. Aidan Leever and Rogers broke multiple tackles on more than one occasion.
“JC ran hard; their feet were moving,” Nichol said. “That number 41 or 37, anyway he’s a big wide and low to the ground running back that flat got after us. They weren’t going down with arm tackles. We put some pretty big licks on them, but they just weren’t going down with arm tackles.
“Form tackling, we practice that stuff every Tuesday, we have a tackling circuit. We are going to probably do it three or four days this week.”
On the first Husky drive of the game, Sweet Home drove 75 yards and scored on a fourth-and-2 from the two-yard line. Quarterback Daniel Virtue ran an option play right into the end zone. Bringing the score to 8-7. Virtue finished the game with 105 yards passing, 47 rushing, and a touchdown passing and rushing.
“I was very pleased, a big improvement with our offense,” Nichol said. “Put as many points on the board tonight as we have in the whole season.”
The problem was, it wasn’t enough to take pressure off the defense early.
Tigers scored three touchdowns, two by Aidan Leever (one rushing and one receiving) to roll up a 29-7 lead second-quarter lead.
“With this offense [Junction City] they lull you into run, run, run. Then they bust out into pass, it’s not fancy routes, it’s just go out into these green spots, straight up and down the field,” Nichol said. “So after you get used to stepping up and they smash you in the mouth and you have to stop the outside sweep and off tackle, all of a sudden, you read your guy wrong. Our guys were kind of caught looking in the backfield, so we changed up our defenses at halftime anf it was a lot more effective.”
With 2:32 on the clock in the second quarter, Virtue took the snap from center Josh Rice on fourth-and-14 and was pressured by the Tigers. Virtue escaped, running up the field and eluding three tackles and carrying defenders to get the ball past the first down marker. On another fourth down from the 13-yard line the Huskies ran an option reverse and, after a few broken tackles, Keanu Aiona walked into the end zone to close the gap to 29-13.
Rogers finished off the third quarter with a 29-yard run to extend the Tiger lead 36-13.
When the game looked like it was over multiple times, the Huskies made plays to stay alive. First, Sweet Home recovered an onside kick with 6:41 to go in the game, but turned the ball over on downs.
The Tigers went three-and-out and the punt was blocked by Virtue. Hayden Nichol picked up the ball and returned it 40 yards for a touchdown to bring the score to 36-27 after a two-point conversion attempt failed.
On the next kickoff, the Huskies recovered their second onside in a row, but Virtue was sacked on consecutive passing plays, and eventually turned the ball over on downs, and effectively ended the game.
“I tell you what, we don’t practice those (side kicks) that often,” Dustin Nichol said. “We have never been that good in practice, but thank goodness we got two back to back in the game. They didn’t adjust to it. They let it bounce off that big fella twice, so thank you.”
He praised Rice for doing “a great job” at center.
“The ground was moist, we worked on that, No fumbles with the quarterback dropping them. Danny and Josh, good for them,” Nichol said. “Danny stood out. I think Colton Smith caught some key passes down the stretch. (Hayden) Nichol carried the ball well in the first half, he got kind of a high ankle sprain there, so he didn’t carry it as much. Again, Blanchard, for a third-string running back, did a good job coming off the shelf with minimum amount of playing time until this week. Our offensive line did better.”
Sweet Plays Sutherlin next week at home. The Bulldogs, winless thus far, have lost at Sisters (44-0) and at home to Elmira 45-28 Friday night.
Scoring Summary
SH 7 6 0 14 – 27
JC 15 14 7 0 – 36
First Quarter
JC—Jake Rogers 64-yard run(Rogers run) 11:22
SH—Daniel Virtue 2-yard run (PAT Good) 6:54
JC—Aidan Leever 23-yard run (PAT Good) 2:54
Second Quarter
JC—Rogers 3-yard run (PAT good) 9:57
JC—Jesse McClintok 26-yard pass to Leever (PAT good) 6:46
SH—Keanu Aiona 13-yard run (PAT Failed) :28
Third Quarter
JC—Rogers 29-yard run (PAT Good) 00:00
Fourth Quarter
SH—Virtue 10-yard pass to Keegan Holly (Virtue run)
SH—Virtue Punt Block/Hayden Nichol return 40 yards (Run failed) 3:01
Individual Statistics
Rushing : SH – Dan Virtue 8-47; Hayden Nichol 9-36; Keanu Aiona 9-14; Eric Blanchard 6-(-9). JC – Jake Rogers 223; Aidan Leever 65; Luke Jackson 8; Travis Hodgson 4; Nick Hogan 1; Jesse McClintock -3.
Passing: SH – Dan Virtue 13-22-105. JC – Jesse McClintock 4-5-76.
Receiving: SH – Colton Smith 2-39; Connor Russell 3-19; Jake Swanson 1-18; Keegan Holly 3-17; Austin James 1-7; Keanu Aiona 2-6; Hayden Nichol 1- (-2). JC – Aidan Leever 2-52; Jadon Stafford 12; Trevin Waddell 12.