Same old story: Olpe wins in a blowout
Josh Slaughter, Special to The Gazette
Saturday, September 27, 2008
Photo by Jordan Haiduk
Mark Windle of the Olpe Eagles sacks quarterback C.J. Madison of the West Elk Patriots Friday night.
Olpe — When the Olpe Eagles last played in the Gazette game of the week, Matt Redeker said that they needed to improve their passing game. On Friday night, that came to fruition as Redeker recorded 194 yards through the air on the Eagles way to a 53-0 victory over West Elk.
“Word has been done (on our passing) I have more patience, I’m taking my time and the line is doing a good job blocking up front and giving me plenty of time,” Redeker said. “When plays need to be made, I try to make them.”
And make them Redeker did, completing 7-of-9 passes for 194 yards and a touchdown. This played out to an average of 27.7 yards per pass as he twice hit receivers on passes of 40-plus yards. His favorite target on the night was Bradley Argabright, who had four catches for 114 yards and a touchdown.
“I dropped a pass early, the one I caught (for 47 yards) was a good pass by Matt,” Argabright said. “The one he hit me on deep (50 yards) was a little short but I was able to come back and get it.”
The 50-yard play, which went for Olpe’s only passing touchdown of the night, looked broken from the beginning as Redeker struggled with the snap and looked to be stopped behind the line of scrimmage. Redeker kept moving, however, and found a way out of the defenders grasp and winged a pass to an open Argabright 44 yards down field. Argabright made the rest of the play with his legs, breaking four Patriot arm tackles to find his way into the end zone.
Photo by Jordan Haiduk
Bradley Argabright of the Olpe Eagles tackles Katlin Wilson of the West Elk Patriots Friday night.
“I can almost count on him (Argabright) getting by,” Redeker said. “I mean they thought it was a fumble so their corner dropped off a little bit and I saw him out of the corner of my eye as I was turning away.”
The Eagles have now won all of their games this season by large margins, mostly coming into this game on the strength of their run game. And Friday was no different on the scoreboard as Cole Krueger rolled for 97 yards on only nine carries — four of which were touchdowns.
“The line blocked really well tonight, they did a really good job,” Krueger said. “It was nice to get a big win tonight.”
Krueger wasn’t the only running back doing the scoring as Josh Lambert ran the ball only three times, but made two of them count. He finished the night with 39 yards and two touchdowns. Tanner Burenheide also added a score for the Eagles as time was running down in the fourth quarter.
“I think our offensive line did a great job,” Olpe coach Chris Schmidt said. “I don’t think they get enough credit sometimes. Tonight, they did a great job. That’s not something that’s going to be in the stats, but I give our offensive and defensive lines a lot of credit.”
Photo by Jordan Haiduk
Kaitlin WIlson of the West Elk Patriots runs the ball down the middle during the game against the Olpe Eagles Friday night.
While the offense seemed to be gaining all the praise, the defense had its best night on the season. The Olpe D did not allow a positive yard until five minutes remained in the first quarter and the Patriots were on their third offensive drive. The defense only allowed a single first down on the night, which came with 41 seconds left in the second quarter. All accounted, the Patriots only mustered 47 yards of total offense.
“We did a great job on defense tonight,” Krueger said. “Our coaches do a great job of picking out what we need to do and we’re able to stop them.”
The Eagles have also piled up a huge margin of victory over their first four games, beating opponents by an average of 45.8 points per game. That is no easy feat considering the Eagles roadtrips so far this season have taken them 372 miles, averaging 186 miles per trip.
“We’ve just got to stay focused,” Redeker said. “Coaches tell us we can’t lose our head on those long trips, don’t get distracted or anything, just keep your head. Stay awake and go down on those long drives and play well.”
The road, and the trips will not get any easier for the Eagles as they must travel to Sedan next week for a Friday match-up. The trip to Sedan will be 172 miles round trip for the Eagles as they face the 1-2 Bluedevils, whose only loss to a Kansas squad comes to 3A’s Sedgewick. The Bluedevils own an impressive 8-6 victory over Oklahoma Union High School in South Coffeyville, Okla.
“Sedan is always solid, you know we go to their place and we’ve always had a pretty good rivalry,” Schmidt said. “We know they are going to come out and they are going to hit hard, and run right at us, so we’re going to have to match that intensity. If we can execute and do the basics, which is battling and blocking, if we do those things, I think we have a shot.”
Olpe 53, West Elk 0
Olpe 20 14 13 6 53
West Elk 0 0 0 0 0
First quarter
Olpe — Lambert 7 run (Krueger kick)
Olpe — Krueger 5 run (Krueger kick)
Olpe — Krueger 7 run (Kick failed)
Second quarter
Olpe — Krueger 2-yard run (Krueger kick)
Olpe — Argabright 50 pass from Redeker (Vaughn kick)
Third quarter
Olpe — Lambert 27 run (Krueger kick)
Olpe — Krueger 4 run (Kick blocked)
Fourth quarter
Olpe — Burnheide 6 run (Kick failed)
GAME STATISTICS
Olpe West Elk
First downs 19 1
Rushes-yards 33-208 26-24
Comp-Att-Int 7-10-0 7-14-0
Pass yards 194 23
INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS
Rushing — OHS: Krueger 9-97, 4 TD; Lambert 3-39, 2 TD; Jacob Kehres 6-19; Jake Brinkman 3-16; Linden Stueve 2-11; Wade Schmidt 1-8; Tyson Pettyjohn 2-7; Redeker 3-6; Burenheide 3-4, 1 TD; Argabright 1-1. WEHS: Talon Nordquist 8-33; Taylor Lowe 2-1; Seth Miller 1- (-8); C.J. Madison 15-(-18).
Passing — OHS: Redeker 7-9 194 yards, 1 TD; Brinkman 0-1. WEHS: Madison 7-14 23 yards.
Receiving — OHS: Argabright 4-114, 1 TD; Josh Klumpe 2-54; Linden Stueve 1-26; Krueger 1-0. WEHS: Lowe 3-16; Tanner Weber 1-5; Miller 2-2.
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Posted by HutchFootball (anonymous) on September 28, 2008 at 12:23 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Sedan owns an impressive victory over Oklahoma Union? I hate to break this to you, but that's not Oklahoma high school power Tulsa Union. Sedan is horrible this year, Olpe will cruise again next week, and look for them to go far in the playoffs.
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