By Jeremy McDonald
Jeremymcdonald73@gmail.com
TURNER, Ore.– It was one of those grinding, marathon like games for the Cascade Football team on Friday night against Scappoose.
But they survived the test. The rose up to the occasion given to them and succeeded.
The Indians jumped out to a 14-0 lead within the first ninety seconds, taking the opening kickoff and turning it into points on their first offensive possession before forcing a fumble, recovering it and then turning that into points that gave them that two-score.
But.
Just as Scappoose built that lead, it quickly disappeared as the Cougars responded. By the 5:59 mark, it was Cascade that led the game at 16-14. Scappoose would regain the lead with 2:41 left in the first quarter off a William Kessi to Drew Butler 12-yard passing connection to hand the Indians a 21-16 lead.
Yeah. After the first quarter, this game felt like that Dallas-Crescent Valley game on October 27, 2022, that saw the Dragons defeating the Raiders 79-71 with how both teams came out firing in the opening 12 minutes.
The difference in this one, though 96 points were scored on Friday night, was Cascade that made the right adjustments defensively to slowly pull away from Scappoose in their 59-37 victory.
Defensively, they went with a three-man front to combat the Indians’ passing game. Kessi threw for three passing scores and had roughly 350 yards in the air, but Scappoose wasn’t as effective in the second and third quarters as the Cougars made them play shallow ball instead of going for those chunk yards.
“As a team, we did really well responding to adversity. Especially our defense when we switched to that three-front to get more reinforcement with our secondary, I think that really made a big change and I think that was really a turning point in the game,” said Matthew Hinkle.
“We forced them down low, so they had to make some short passes and get them over the top. That’s how we started it,” adds Josiah Hawkins.
With their offense still riding high after their strong finish to the first quarter, the Cougars regained the lead and extended it to two-possession by halftime, leading 38-24 and led 52-30 after three quarters.
Bryce Kunezi and Cade Coreson led the offense with Kuenzi rushing for 100 yards and Coreson throwing for over 200 yards to help lead the Cougars to a 3-0 start to the season going into their non-league finale on September 19 at Tillamook.
“We’re not close to where we need to be for sure to win a State Championship. We just need to go every day, be better every day, and keep doing things that we’re doing out here and keeping everyone healthy,” said Hawkins.
The Cougars return home on October 3 when they’ll host Molalla to open 4A Special District 2 action.
Photos By Jeremy McDonald
