Hastings 38, Northwest 21
With the way the offenses ate up yards and clock it only took a couple stops to make the difference.
The Saxons got them.
The Hastings varsity football team improved to 3-1 on the season with a 38-21 victory at Jackson Northwest Friday night.
Hastings fumbled the ball away on the first possession of the ballgame, but scored touchdowns on its next five drives. Robby Slaughter made up for the miscue that ended the Saxons' first drive by finishing the Saxons' next drive with a 26-yard touchdown run that tied the game at 7-7, with the help of Kaiden Shumway's extra-point kick.
The Saxons took the lead, 15-7 on a seven-yard touchdown run by Lanny Teunessen and a two-point run by TJ Russell three minutes into the second quarter and then held a lead for the rest of the evening.
Saxon quarterback Mason Denton tossed a three-yard touchdown pass to Russell on the final play of the first half and then threw a two-point pass to Evan Eastman to give Hastings a 23-13 lead at the half. Denton then added a pair of touchdown runs in the second half, one from two yards out and one from 13 yards. Teunessen added the two-point run after Denton's two-yard touchdown run midway through the third quarter. Shumway booted an extra point after Denton's 13-yard touchdown run midway through the fourth.
Teunessen led the Saxon offense with 15 carries for 128 yards. Russell also went over the 100-yard mark, rushing 17 times for 104 yards. Slaughter had 12 rushes for 52 yards.
The Saxons overall compiled 317 yards rushing. Denton completed all four of his pass attempts for 32 yards.
Northwest did much of its moving of the football though the air. Quarterback Isaiah Grybauskas was 10-of-18 passing for 223 yards and two touchdowns. He tossed a 20-yard touchdown pass to JR Morrow for a touchdown that pulled his team within 15-13 briefly in the second quarter, and then tossed a second TD pass, to Connor Romm, in the fourth quarter.
Romm finished the night with three receptions for 93 yards. Teammate Devin Kalis had three receptions covering 42 yards.
Victor Ramirez had a team-high 8 tackles for the Saxons. Corbin Ulrich and Zach Perry had 4.5 tackles each.
The Saxons are now at the top of the Interstate-8 Athletic Conference this fall as Hastings, Coldwater and Parma Western are all 3-1 overall. Parma Western and Coldwater are both 3-1 as well, and 2-1 in conference play. Previously unbeaten Parma Western and Coldwater both lost Friday. Marshall knocked off Parma Western 41-27 Friday while Harper Creek scored a 28-7 win over Coldwater.
Thornapple Kellogg 21, Ottawa Hills 7
The Thornapple Kellogg varsity football team made it two in a row with a 21-7 win over Ottawa Hills at Houseman Field in Grand Rapids Friday night.
The Trojans scored the game's first 21 points, pitching a shut out until the Bengals scored with 23 seconds remaining in the fourth quarter. Ryan Holmes had a team-high 7 tackles for the Trojans and Richard Heikkila had 4. Sean Flynn had 3.5 tackles and a sack.
The TK defense held the Bengals to just 141 yards of offense and only eight first downs.
“They flew around they tackled decent,” TK head coach Jeff Dock said of his defense. “In doing that, they were able to keep them in front of us. We had good coverage behind, so they couldn't get their passing game going. I thought we tackled well and we filled holes and kept them contained for the most part.”
Mitchell Middleton carried the Trojan offense, especially late in the game, rushing 18 times for 97 yards and two touchdowns. He scored his team's first points on a 12-yard touchdown run in the first quarter and then tacked on a five-yard touchdown run with 2:34 to go in the ballgame. He was also a perfect 3-for-3 on extra-point kicks, and Dock was happy to send him out onto the field to try a 57-yard field goal, five yards over his school-record, late in the third quarter. That kick came up just short though.
“[Middleton] was just the workhorse,” Dock said. “Late in the game we were able to give him the ball and let him run some clock out. up front they did a good job late in the game of getting movement and allowing us to just milk the clock.”
Trojan quarterback Reese Garbrecht was 4-of-5 passing for 71 yards and a touchdown. He hit Cole Shoobridge with a 35-yard touchdown pass with two minutes to play in the first half that ultimately gave TK a 14-0 halftime lead. Garbrecht also rushed 11 times for 49 yards.
Alex Bonnema had two catches for 26 yards for TK. Samuel McKeown had five rushes for 31 yards.
The Trojans still had some penalties to clean up in the ballgame. Dock said a couple flags wiped out nice passing plays by his quarterback. The Trojans lost a fumble on the opening drive of the second half, the only turnover of the ballgame.
Ottawa Hills scored its touchdown in the final minute when quarterback Scharai Horton connected with Kamarion Craig for a 33-yard score.
The Trojans will face their toughest test of the month of October as they play host to South Christian Friday, Oct. 16. South Christian moved its record to 4-0 with a 32-14 win at Cedar Springs Friday night.
Merrill 56, Maple Valley 28
Maple Valley will go to work the next two weekends looking to gain some momentum and ideally a seed worthy of a home playoff contest.
The Lions fell to 1-3 overall this season with a 56-28 loss to the visiting Merrill Vandals Friday night.
Merrill had just a 22-16 lead after a 15-yard touchdown pass by Lion quarterback Blaze Sensiba to Hunter Bassett with just over five minutes to play in the first half. Sensiba added the two-point run following that touchdown.
Merrill though got a 90-yard touchdown run from Logan Heath with 48 seconds to go in the first half and then intercepted a Sensiba pass to get the chance to score one more time before the half. A couple penalty flags against the Lions gave the Vandals two untimed downs at the end of the half. Jacob McCormick plowed into the end zone and added a two-point run to push his team's lead to 34-16 at the half.
The Vandals then outscored the Lions 22-12 in the second half.
Logan Heath threw three touchdown passes for the Vandals in the first half, a 30-yarder and a 39-yarder Conner Neuenfeldt and a 35-yarder to Cayden Sysak. Neuenfeldt also scored on an eight-yard run in the second half. Sysak added a second TD catch, on a 14-yard pass from McCormick, with 3:45 to go in the fourth quarter.
Zack Breasbois scored the first points of the second half for the Vandals on a 65-yard touchdown run with three minutes to go in the third quarter.
Heath finished with seven rushes for 136 yards and Breasbois nine for 126 yards.
Hugheston Heckathorn had 20 rushes for 94 yards for the Lions. Tyler Rose had a big night running the football too for Maple Valley, carrying it 11 times for 87 yards.
Sensiba contributed 11 rushes for 50 yards and completed 5-of-12 passes for 68 yards. Head coach Marty Martin said his senior quarterback made a couple of tremendous plays to dodge blitzers on his two touchdown passes.
Sensiba's second TD pass was an 11-yarder to Reese Proctor-Burhans in the opening minute of the fourth quarter.
Tyler Rose tacked on a 1-yard TD run for the Lions with 93 seconds left in the game.
Heckathorn led the Lion defense with seven tackles. Sensiba and Cody Taylor had four each.
Coach Martin said his defense struggled with the Vandals' speed in space, and their size the rest of the time.
He was pleased with kicker Owen Bailey's play. He averaged over 40 yards per punt and hit three kickoffs for touchbacks.
The Lions go to work now to prep for a Saturday afternoon ballgame against Webberville in Nashville Oct. 1. The Lions then close out the regular season at home against Bellevue Oct. 23.
Olivet 30, Lakewood 6
Garrett Stank plowed into the end zone from ten yards out as the clock struck 0:00.
It wasn't the kind of buzzer beater a high school football player dreams of though. He lay on the ground an extra moment or two before Olivet's big sophomore lineman Braydon Wine offered him an arm and helped pull him off the turf.
There was no unnecessary extra-point attempt.
Olivet continued its dominance of the Greater Lansing Activities Conference and the Lakewood varsity football team as it scored a 30-6 win Friday. The Eagles are now 4-0 overall this fall and 3-0 in the GLAC.
Lakewood falls to 2-2 with the loss and 2-1 in the GLAC. The Vikings will be at home to take on Leslie Oct. 16.
The Viking defense didn't have an answer for the Eagles' ground game, led by junior quarterback Clay Flower and sophomore running back Ramsey Bousseau.
The Eagles moved right towards the Viking goal-line to open the ballgame, but lost a fumble which the Vikings recovered at the 1-yard-line. The turnover didn't hurt the Eagles too badly. Moments later the Vikings were tackled in the end zone for a safety.
Olivet marched down the field again to get a 1-yard touchdown run by Flower and an extra-point by senior Connor Maurer to go up 9-0. Olivet's next possession ended in a 27-yard touchdown pass from Flower to Maurer and another e.p.
The Vikings managed just two first downs in the first half, then picked up two more on its first drive of the second half before turning the ball over on downs.
The Eagles went 70 yards in 11 plays to get a 4-yard touchdown run by Flower with 54.5 seconds left in the third quarter.
Olivet finished the scoring with a 7-yard touchdown run by senior running back Michael Groves.
Lakewood got its late touchdown against the Eagle reserves, with back-up quarterback Nathan Willette running the offense. Willette, Stank, Sawyer Stoepker all kept running hard as the clock wound down.
Hudsonville 17, Caledonia 7
Dylan Ham made two big plays for his Eagles and the Caledonia offense just couldn't move the ball consistently enough Friday night.
The Fighting Scots fell to 1-3 on the season with a 17-7 loss to visiting Hudsonville.
Ham hauled in a short pass and took it 87 yards to the end zone two minutes into the second half. The Eagle defense forced a three-and-out and then Ham snagged the ensuing punt and returned it 58 yards for a score.
Emanuel Dieppa hit a pair of extra-point kicks following those Eagle touchdowns after a 39-yard field goal in the final minute of the first quarter.
Carson VanderHoff scored the Scots' lone touchdown three and a half minutes into the second quarter to put his team in front, on a 14-yard run. Paul Voegler added the extra-point kick.
It was a rough night for the Caledonia offense. VanderHoff was on and off the field with an injury.
The Scots shuttled between styles offensively. Sophomore quarterback Mason McKenzie had a pass intercepted in the end zone in the closing moments of the first half and another late in the third quarter.
Caledonia went to the wish-bone offense at times, with senior Caleb Sprague taking over at quarterback in those instances. He led the drive which culminated in VanderHoff's touchdown run.
VanderHoff finished the night with 26 rushes for 148 yards. McKenzie was 9-of-19 passing with four interceptions The third came near midfield midway through the fourth quarter Sophomore receiver Justice Reed had five receptions for 27 yards.
Ham picked off a McKenzie pass to end the Scots' last offensive possession of the game.
The Caledonia defense was outstanding other than the one big pass play to Ham. The Eagles managed just 135 yards of offense and only six first downs all game.
The Fighting Scots go on the road Oct. 16 to face the 4-0 Grandville Bulldogs.