March 28, 2024

Eagles rout Tigers for homecoming win, secure playoff berth

AFTON — Friday night’s football game was a good one for East Union in multiple ways.

The Eagles’ 66-12 victory over the Guthrie Center Tigers (1-6, 0-4) gave them not only a homecoming win but also moved them to 2-1 in Eight-man District 7, securing them one of four district berths in the state playoffs.

The Eagles currently sit in third place in the district, behind undefeated Glidden-Ralston and Coon Rapids-Bayard (4-3, 3-1), which the Eagles will face in their final game of the season.

Despite the blowout win, the Eagles got off to a shaky start. A fumble on their opening drive gave the Tigers the ball in Eagle territory. The Tigers capitalized four plays later on a 25-yard Logan Scheuermann touchdown pass to receiver Matt Vannatta, which made the score 6-0.

East Union answered on the next drive, punching it into the endzone on a 3-yard run by senior Mike Ward. A Sanden Cheers run on the two-point conversion put the Eagles up 8-6. The Eagles would go on to outscore the Tigers 58-6 for the remainder of the game.

A dominant ground game has been the Eagles’ success all year, and co-coach James Hardy said that again establishing the ground game early in this game was his strategy.

“We knew with what we’d seen on film that we would have the possibility of getting that going early,” he said. “When you’re looking at clock and ball control and ground game and field position, those are big things that we wanted to try to do.”

The Eagles rushed for 350 yards on the evening, with four players — three of them quarterbacks — finding the end zone on the ground at least once. Ward, who came into the game leading the team with more than 1,200 rushing yards and 17 touchdowns, racked up 231 yards and three scores. Sophomore quarterback Sanden Cheers added 19 yards, rushing for two scores in the first quarter and adding a 45-yard touchdown strike to junior tight end Mason Gossman in the third. Senior quarterback Ryan Collins added 40 yards rushing, including a 33-yard score in the second quarter.

Guthrie Center coach Mark McDermott said he expected to see a lot of running, especially by Ward, who came in averaging 7.9 yards per carry.

“We knew it’d be tough to stop Ward,” McDermott said. “He’s a big, strong kid, and we knew that’d be a tough challenge.”

On the defensive side, East Union stifled the Tiger running game, forcing them to rely on their passing attack. The Tigers saw some success — both Tiger touchdowns were on passing plays. However, the Tiger quarterbacks also threw two interceptions.

Hardy said defending the pass is something his team has been working on in practice.

“That’s something they’ve seen as kind of our Achilles’ heel at some point in time, so we’ve been working on that a lot,” he said. “We have a bend-don’t-break type of attitude: keep it in front of them and, you know, you’ll give up one or two once in awhile, but that’s where you’re trying to be aggressive.”

East Union travels to Adair-Casey (0-7, 0-3) next week and then will finish the season at home against Coon Rapids-Bayard (4-3, 3-1) .

East Union 66,

Guthrie Center 12

Points by quarter

EU 24 6 14 22 - 66

GC 0 0 6 0 - 12

SCORING SUMMARY

First Quarter

GC — Matt Vannatta 25 pass from Logan Sheuermann (run failed)

EU — Mike Ward 3 run (Sanden Cheers run)

EU — Cheers 4 run (Ward run), 4:40

EU — Cheers 1 run (Kyle Seales run), 0:41

Second Quarter

EU — Ryan Collins 33 run (run failed), 10:51

Third Quarter

GC — Jacob Joliet 5 pass from Logan Sheuermann (run failed), 6:43

EU — Mason Gossman 45 pass from Cheers (run failed), 5:57

EU — Ward 2 run (Ward run), 1:28

Fourth Quarter

EU — Ward 34 run (Gabe Nixon pass from Cheers), 9:37

EU — Joshua Hardy 28 run (run failed), 5:01

EU — Dillon Weis 7 pass from Hardy (Matthew Wittstock run), 1:44

Individual leaders

Rushing: EU - Mike Ward 29-231, Ryan Collins 4-40, Sanden Cheers 4-19, Kole Seales 4-13, Matt McGuire 3-18, Joshua Hardy 1-29.

Passing: EU - Sanden Cheers 2-2-0 for 48 yards, Joshua Hardy 1-1-0 for 7 yards.

Receiving: EU - Mason Gossman 1-45, Gabe Nixon 1-3, Dillon Weis 1-7.

Tackles (solo-assists): EU - Beau Boswell 11, Bobby Hepner 10, Gabe Nixon 8, Clayton Miller 7, Kyle Seales 7.