Eagles, Wildcats, Pirates advance in close SE race

St. John/Endicott, Colton and Pomeroy moved up in the SE Eights standings with wins in the Friday round. The Eagles, who prevailed against the Garfield/Palouse Vikings at Palouse claimed sole possession of the league’s top spot.

Coach Bob Clements said the Eagles still have tough tests in the league and don’t intend to look past any foe in their last four regular games. They host last-place Sunnyside Christian this week, but Clements said they don’t intend to look past the Knights.

ST. JOHN/ENDICOTT rolled past Garfield/Palouse Friday at Palouse with a mixed running and passing attack. Both teams rolled up the yards, but the Eagles booked a better return on their possessions.

Final score for the Eagle win was 42-28. Coaches for both sides noted the breakout plays for the Eagles accounted for a lot of the difference.

Cole McCanna scored four TDs for the Eagles, all on long gains. McCanna finished with 235 yards on 13 carries.

Kyle Raynor, back in the QB slot, hit 8 of 13 passes for 169 yards. Kyle Raynor also rushed for 87 yards on five carries.

JB Lange had another workhorse night for the Vikings. Lange tallied 228 yards on 30 carries. His longest score was a 69 yard kickoff return in the first half.

McCanna escaped on a 41 yard scoring run for the first Eagle TD. Raynor then hit Evan Raynor on a 61-yard pass play for the next score, and McCanna scored on a 42 yard shot. The Eagle QB booked the last score of the half on a 61 yard breakout.

SE EIGHTS STANDINGS

St. John/End. 2-0 4-1 200 142

Pomeroy 2-1 3-3 328 196

Colton 2-1 3-3 160 154

Garfield/Palouse 1-1 2-3 152 140

Touchet 1-2 3-2 155 124

LaX /Washtucna 1-2 2-4 180 242

Snysd Christian 0-2 1-3 80 157

Viking quarterback Anthony Floyd threw three TD passes, a 23 yarder and a 27 yarder to Wyatt Mitchell and a five yard shot to Ben Weagraff in the last quarter.

The Vikings this week will travel to Pomeroy to face a tough Pirate team which is coming off a big win over LaCrosse/Washtucna.

COLTON Friday moved up a notch in the standings with a 34-16 win over Touchet. Coach Clark Vining noted the game featured long-time ball possessions for both teams.

Touchet started the possession mode when they campaigned for nine minutes to get an early lead on a score by QB Jake Hodenfield.

The Wildcats were able to bounce back with a seven minute drive the ended in the second quarter. Colton stacked 20 points before the half to take a 20-16 lead into the locker.

Coach Clark Vining said a big play for the Wildcats was Steve Eacker’s interception at the five yard line to stop a Touchet drive. The chiefs at that point were trailing 16-28 and a score at that point would have put the game back on the front burner.

Colton QB Josh Straughan had a 23-29 passing night for 290 yards, but the Wildcats scores went into the books on short runs by Straughan. He capped the first drive for the first Wildcat score in the second quarter. Holdan Druffel ended the second drive with a short TD run.

Hodenfield then answered for Touchet with a 55-yard breakout before the half, but the Wildcats scored again before the break.

Eacker had nine catches for 118 yards, and Taylor Spence finished with nine catches for 105 yards. Holdan Druffel was 3-51 receiving, and Matt Becker was 2-18.

The Wildcats this week will host Zack Simpkins and the Liberty Christian power team in a non-leaguer.

POMEROY and LaCrosse/Washtucna waged an offensive battle Friday at Pomeroy with the host Pirates stacking a 70-50 win. Tigercat Coach Jeff Nelson said the LW offense kept cooking most of the night, but poor tackling by the defense made the difference.

Pomeroy’s two power backs, Tory Knebel and Austin Reisdorph, delivered the yards and the TDs. Pomeroy’s chart had Knebel with 396 yards rushing. He scored seven of the Pirate TDs.

Tigercat QB Jake Aune booked a 24-46 night passing for 324 air yards. He threw for five TDs.

Jeff Zimmer had nine receptions for 140 yards and scored four times. Sam Harder had eight snags for 110 yards and a score.

Sawyer Hostetler scored two more of the Tigercat TDs and had 70 yards rushing.

Sam Harder led the Tigercat defense with 11 tackles.

“The bad part of that is that he’s a safety. If the safety is making that many tackles it’s because the people in front of him are not making that many tackles,” Coach Nelson noted.

The Tigercats host Touchet this Friday at Washtucna. Number one assignment for the defense will be to stop Hodenfield.