PLYMOUTH – It was just an old fashioned whipping for Plymouth’s Rockies at the hands of NorthWood as the Panthers left no doubt in ending their undefeated regular season and NLC championship with a 56-8 win at Plymouth.
“There’s really not a lot you can say,” said Plymouth coach John Barron. “It didn’t look like we were ready to play a football game and during the week I thought we were. Kids are kids and you don’t know where their minds are sometimes. We allowed them to score really at will against base plays that we repped over and over again in practice. They just came in and imposed their will.”
Literally.
The Panthers Bronson Yoder scored on the first three NorthWood possessions on runs of 57, 50 and 89 yards also giving him almost 200 yards rushing in the first eight minutes of play. He ended the night with 231 yards on 10 rushes.
“He’s a good player,” said Barron. “He is as advertised. Their offensive line took it to us. We didn’t get off blocks very well. I feel like we have good players too. It’s the worst loss I’ve ever been a part of. They came in and didn’t do anything tricky, didn’t do anything differently.”
The Panther offensive line did have their way for most of the game with NorthWood simply running power football between the tackles, keeping Yoder free of tacklers into the Plymouth secondary time and again.
Nate Newcomer had a pair of touchdown runs at quarterback in relief of Yoder Jaden Miller and Veshon Malone each had TD catches and Miller also had a 90 yard pick six in the third quarter.
Meanwhile the NorthWood defense was everything that it was advertised to be coming in giving up an average of just 12 points a game and holding the Rockies scoreless until late in the contest. In the first quarter the Plymouth offense struggled to manage a positive offensive play either run or pass.
Late in the half the Rockie offense put together a couple of drives but couldn’t make them equal points. Sparking again in the second half, the Plymouth offense again couldn’t put together enough positives to put points on the board until Cole Filson took a screen pass 44 yards to the house for the only Plymouth score, with Blake Davis pushing across a two point conversion.
“I thought Ivan Winkle played very hard,” said Barron. “Cole (Filson) was our player of the game just by his leadership and his tenacity and never give up attitude.”
Winkle ended the night leading the defense with nine tackles.
Plymouth did manage to put up 300 yards of total offense with Blake Reed running for 65 and Teddy Pratt for 60 yards. Joe Barron was able to hit on 15 of 32 attempts for 189 yards but had three interceptions to go with the touchdown.
“I thought our offense showed a little bit of fight but when you look up at the board it’s kind of demoralizing when you’re down that many scores,” said Barron. “There’s not a whole lot of positives you take from this other than we have them on film and we play them again. We worked a week to prepare for that offense. Where you go from there is you do a little soul searching and hopefully the kids come back ready to go on Tuesday.”
Plymouth is 6-3 on the year. NorthWood is now 9-0 and NLC champs. Both teams meet again next week at NorthWood in round one of the IHSAA sectional tournament.
•NORTHWOOD 56, PLYMOUTH 8
Northwood 28 8 13 7 0 – 56 Plymouth 0 0 0 8 0 – 8
First Quarter
11:25 NW TD Bronson Yoder carries(QB Keeper) 57 yds, PAT Pass from Nate Newcomer to Bronson Yoder NO Good.
6:46 NW TD Bronson Yoder carries(QB Keeper) 50 yds PAT Pass from Tanner Feenstra INTERCEPTED by Ivan WINKLE
4:30 NW TD Bronson Yoder carries(QB Keeper) 89 yds PAT Run by Bronson Yoder GOOD.
2:26 NW TD Bronson Yoder passes to Jaden Miller 62 yds PAT Run by Bronson Yoder.
Second Quarter
9:01 NW Safety, Joe Barron carries(Hand Off) -1 yds
8:46 NW TD Nate Newcomer carries(Hand Off) 16 yds PAT Kick by Bronson Yoder NO Good
Third quarter
6:58 NW TD Nate Newcomer passes to Veshon Malone 23 yds PAT Kick by Andrew Graber GOOD.
4:38 NW TD Joe Barron passes to Seth Rundell INTERCEPTED by Jaden Miller 90 yds PAT Kick by Andrew Graber blocked by Seth Rundell
Fourth Quarter
11:55 NW TD Nate Newcomer carries(QB Keeper) 2 yds PAT Kick by Andrew Graber GOOD.
9:48 PHS TD Joe Barron passes to Cole FILSON 44 yds PAT Run by Blake Davis GOOD.
Rushing – (NorthWood 40 carries 365 yards) Yoder 10-231 3TD, Mestach 6-43, Newcomer 9-42 2TD, Malone 5-26. (Plymouth 38-111) Reed 13-65, Pratt 6-60, Filson 5-32, Davis 1 -1.
Passing – Yoder 2-4 68 yds, TD, Newcomer 2-3 38 yds TD, Barron 15-32 189 yds TD, 3 INT.
Receiving – J. Miller 2-68 TD, Rundell 5-77, Filson 5-71 TD.
Tackles – I. Winkle 9, Diego Garcia 8.
