Jason Casey
Sweet Home’s defense made a statement Friday as the Huskies dominated Junction City, exiting their last regular-season home game with a 39-0 win.
The Tigers didn’t get into the red zone until their final derive of the game. Combine that defense with Colton Smith’s best passing game of the season and it was a runaway.
And it wasn’t just passing. Hayden McDonald got things started for the offense when he took an option pitch from Smith and raced down the sideline for 67 yards at the end of the first quarter, later capping off the drive with a two-yard touchdown run on fourth down.
McDonald finished the game with 104 yards rushing on 15 attempts and two touchdowns.
The young Husky team clearly took the previous week’s 53-12 loss to Cottage Grove as a learning experience and came back hungry.
“You learn from your losses,” said McDonald. “In your wins, you don’t really learn much but ‘Hey, I’m a good team,’ but your losses – that’s where you learn something.”
“We were really kind of upset about last week, and a couple of guys really got down on themselves,” said senior offensive lineman Bryce Coulter. “They let the score get to them. We kind of dug deep and made sure it wouldn’t happen again.”
Coach Dustin Nichol said he told the team going into the Cottage Grove game that “either we were going to be giant slayers or they are going to expose every weakness we have.”
The good news, he said, was the Huskies have three games following the loss to fix their problems.
“Cottage Grove was a character-building moment for us,” he said. “I rewarded the kids who played to the end. The people who quit were off the field at Junction City and I told some kids this is what you need to do to get back onto the field.
“If I leave the same 11 guys on the field, I leave the same 11 on the field.”
Sweet Home’s offense really got rolling against Junction City in the second quarter. Smith found Jake Swanson, his 6-4 tight end, for a 16-yard touchdown.
“(Swanson) is turning into an animal,” Smith said. “I love throwing him the ball because it’s pretty much a guaranteed catch if it’s in his reach. I’ve been working on my short game all week because I’ve been consistently getting yelled at for not throwing the short passes and always going long. My completion percentage showed it, so I worked on my short routes all this week, and I hit them.”
After Keegan Holly caught a 14-yard touchdown pass from Smith, the Huskies smelled blood.
Cottage Grove quarterback Austin Stevens’ half pooch half onside was caught by Estafanos Gerdes, but Nick Mauler got down the field and hit Gerdes. Gerdes coughed up the ball, which was recovered by Connor Russell.
On the next play, Smith and Swanson connected again for a 29-yard pass. A hold set the Husky offense back, but on fourth-and-3 Coach Dustin Nichol gave the ball to McDonald, who plunged into the end zone,extending Sweet Home’s lead to 27-0.
Smith finished the game 18 for 26 with 252 yards and three touchdowns. He spread the ball around to eight different players.
“This game was pretty difficult because they were sending seven every play,” said Coulter. “We had to step up because we were outmanned over there we really did it, and the score reflects that.”
In the second half, the Sweet Home defense smothered the Tigers who only gained 108 yards of offense. The ground and pound offense never got rolling, and when Junction City started passing, they didn’t find success until the last drive of the game. The Tigers quarterback Nick VanCurler was 10 for 21 with 65 yards passing with two interceptions, and 28 of those yards came on three passes on the last drive of the game.
Early in the fourth quarter Marler got involved on the offensive end, catching three passes in a row of six, nine, and 29 yards, which was his first touchdown of the season.
“Coming off the bench I don’t get much time,” Marler said. “But the time that I have I have to make the most of it. Coach, he just trusted me and going in for those three plays, I just did what I practiced every single day, and the team came through to the blocking to the passing everything just clicked.”
Next week the Huskies face Sutherlin (2-4, 1-2) who lost 34-8 to Elmira last week after beating Sisters 14-0 the week before.
“Our league is kind of weird,” Nichol said. “Our league is kind of weird. We beat Sisters 28-8 and Sisters gets beat by Sutherlin.”
The Huskies’ goal is clear, he said: a second-place league finish by winning their remaining two games and a home play-in game.
“We’ll see what happens. We have to do our business and win the next next two games.
“This is Sutherlin’s Homecoming and Senior Night. The last time we were in this position, we ended up winning it by three points on a last-second Hail Mary pass. We need to play a complete game like we did against Junction City and move on from there.
“Right now we control our own destiny. We are actually in a pretty good spot going forward. If we can maintain our ranking and take second in our league outright, then we should host a play-in game. The kids just need to look at this one game.
“This is for a league play-in game.”
Game Summary
1 2 3 4
SH 6 21 6 6 – 39
JC 0 0 0 0 – 0
1st quarter
SH- :35 Hayden McDonald 2-yard run (2-pt no good)
2nd quarter
SH – 6:53 Colton Smith 16-yard pass to Jake Swanson (2-pt good Smith to Swanson)
SH – 1:25 Smith 14-yard pass to Keegan Holly (PAT Good)
SH – :08 McDonald 3-yard run
3rd quarter
SH – 7:24 Smith 9-yard pass to Nathan Virtue (PAT no good)
4th quarter
SH – 10:50 Smith 25-yard pass to Nick Marler
Individual Stats
Rushing: Sweet Home – Colton smith 5-25; Hayden McDonald 15-104-2; Austin James 12-38. Junction City – Zach Moony 8-15; Jesse McClintok 7-26; Tanner Crane 3-7; Hunter VanCurler 2- (-)1.
Passing: Sweet Home – 18-26-252-3-1. Junction City- Hunter VanCurler 10-21-65-0-2
Receiving: Sweet Home – Keegan Holly 4-49-1; Nathan Virtue 4-50-1;Casey Tow 1-(-)2;Jake Swanson 2-45; Hayden McDonald 2-24; Austin James 2-27; Nick Marler 3-40; Connor Russell 1-25. Junction City – Zach Moony 3-16; Jesse McClintock 2-26; Estifanos Gerdes 3-16; Ryan Crowley 1-2.