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OCTOBER 28, 2016, KEIZERTIMES, PAGE A13 McNary drops non-conference game By DEREK WILEY Of the Keizertimes McNary head coach Jeff Auvinen was blunt after his team’s 38-17 loss to North Medford on Friday, Oct. 21. The Celtics laid an egg. “They just played a lot harder than we did,” Auvinen said. “They took it to us and played with more intensity. We got caught kind of fl at-footed and by the time we responded, we were still in the game, and then we got caught fl at-footed again and didn’t respond near- ly as well.” North Medford entered the game with a pass-fi rst spread offense but the Black Tornado did most of its damage against McNary on the ground, rush- ing for 200 yards and passing for only 49. “I fi gured they would like to run the ball,” Auvinen said. “They just haven’t been very effective at at. They were much better today, obviously, and took it to us.” North Medford scored on its fi rst drive with a 6-yard run to take an early 7-0 lead. But the Celtics quickly answered as quarterback Josiah Gilbert hit Brendan Van Voorhis in stride for an 84-yard touch- down pass to tie the game at 7-7 with 7:19 remaining in the fi rst quarter. The Black Tornadoes add- ed another 6-yard touchdown run on its next possession but McNary again responded. On fourth-and-goal from the 1-yard line, Gilbert pushed his way into the end zone and AJ NETS, continued from Page 12 think they’re much improved. I know our girls have been working really hard so I think GRIDIRON, continued from Page 12 “Our offensive line blocked very well and gave Jack plenty of time to get his passes off,” Claggett head coach Aaron Johnk’s extra point tied the game 14-14 with 7:23 re- maining in the second quarter. North Medford returned the following kickoff 87 yards to take a 21-14 lead. Gilbert them fumbled, giv- ing the Black Tornadoes the ball at their own 41-yard line. But the Celtic defense stood strong as Caleb Kiefi uk-Yates sacked North Medford quar- terback Javan Gail on third down to force a punt. With 36 seconds remaining in the second quarter, Lucas Garvey lined up at quarter- back but the North Medford defense wasn’t fooled and Garvey threw an interception to close the fi rst half. McNary caught a break early in the third quarter when the Black Tornadoes muffed a punt and the Celtics recovered at their opponent’s 35-yard line. On third-and-8 from the 18-yard line, Gilbert appeared to have Van Voorhis open in the end zone but the pass was short and McNary had to set- tle for a Johnk 35-yard fi eld goal to get within 21-17. North Medford had its own chance to kick a fi eld goal but on fourth-and-6 from the Celtic 16, decided to go for it and Garvey broke up a pass in the end zone. Defense then took over the game. The Black Tornadoes started their next two posses- sions at the McNary 39 and 24-yard lines, respectively, but got zero points to show for it as both drives ended in punts. In between, the Celtics weren’t able to do anything either. After a 5-yard pen- alty, Gilbert threw three in- complete passes and McNary punted. North Medford was then able to place a punt on the Celtic 1-yard line. After three plays and gaining zero yards, the Celtics elected to take a knee in the end zone for a safety rather than try to punt. “That was my call,” Auvin- en said. “We had trouble on the last punt. We were on the 1-yard line and the last punt went to about the 23. Let’s see if we can reverse the fi eld a little bit.” The decision looked like the correct one when North Medford later blocked a Mc- Nary punt and returned it for a touchdown to expand its lead to 30-17 with 11:25 re- maining in the game. The Celtics continued to do little on offense, turning the ball over on downs at the North Medford 42-yard line with 10:06 left to play. “We struggled all night long controlling the line of scrimmage,” Auvinen said. “I thought we had them tired in the second quarter and started moving the ball a little bit but we couldn’t duplicate that af- ter. We weren’t throwing the ball on time frequently, rather it was good coverage or the rush was too much pressure. There were a lot of reasons.” Garvey was able to mo- mentarily stop the bleeding, intercepting Gail at the Mc- Nary 3-yard line. However, three plays later, McNary was called for intentional ground- ing, which resulted in another safety and gave North Med- ford a 32-17 lead. With only 21 seconds re- maining, Gail threw a 4-yard touchdown pass to complete the scoring. McNary fi nished with 59 yards rushing on 31 carries. Gilbert was 9-for-25 passing for 203 yards. “It was a playoff type atmo- sphere,” Auvinen said. “Maybe we got our egg laid at this juncture and in the scheme of things it’s not going to make or break us, two weeks from now it will make or break us.” it will be a very competitive match.” Claggett’s varsity team im- proved to 4-4 after defeating Waldo on Monday, Oct. 24. “They’re a dynamic group of girls and they play very well,” Richardson said of her team. “We beat Walker (earlier this year), which was a huge defeat because we hadn’t beat them in years. That was a huge accomplishment because they’ve always been a really good team. We’ve had close matches with them in the past and hadn’t come out on top. It was a huge victory.” A win over Whiteaker would also be huge since the Wolverines have won every game in the series but one, fi ve years ago. “I think Whiteaker is going to be a good game,” Richard- son said. “We’ve always played tough against Whiteaker so I’m expecting another tough game. It’s going to be a good rival matchup.” The B-teams will begin the action at 3:30 p.m. Varsity will then follow. Carr said. “We’ve been on quite a roll lately, the hard work of our kids and the way they’ve improved so much over a short time. Defi nite- ly, we are improving every game.” Led by its defense, White- aker opened its season 3-0 before falling to Waldo and Crossler. The Wolverines then tied Leslie 8-8 on Wednesday, Oct. 19. Whiteaker dominated to- tal yardage and time of pos- session, but failed to score on three drives that ended inside the Leslie 25. “We did a very poor job of fi nishing our drives,” Larimer said. “When you work hard to move down the fi eld like that, you need to capitalize, and we did not do it.” Whiteaker drove the length of the fi eld on its fi rst poses- sion and scored on a 6-yard touchdown run by Cameron Parks. Running back Quen- tin Camenisch led all rushers with 83 yards on 18 carries. “We did a solid job run- ning the ball and our offense was good enough to run by far the most plays in a game that we have all year,” Larimer said. “We just executed poorly in the red zone.” The Wolverines drove nearly 60 yards in the fi nal four minutes to the Leslie 8-yard line. But ultimately, Les- lie stopped the Panthers on fourth-and-2 just short of the fi rst down. Whiteaker’s defense was led by Ethan Schurr, who recov- ered a fumble and an onside kick, and Griffi n Hubbard, who had four tackles for loss and a sack. Isaac Evarts and Hunter Zimmermann each had a game-high six tackles. Whiteaker and Claggett Creek will play at McNary High School. The junior var- sity teams kick off at 5 p.m. followed by the varsity at 7. “For a lot of these kids it’s the fi rst time they’ve ever played under the lights so it’s a huge deal and it’s a big rivalry game,” Carr said. “The kids should be pumped up and ready to go.” The players will also get the full experience of hav- ing a color guard present the national anthem as well as school bands. “We want the kids to feel like they’re playing high school football for one night because then we hook them in to McNary,” Larimer said. There’s tenuous balance be- tween wanting to have a rival- ry with your sister school but not forgetting that Aaron Carr and I both have the same goal, that (Whiteaker Principal) Ju- lie DeWitt and (Claggett Prin- cipal) Rob Schoepper both have the same goal, to have these kids have a great experi- ence in football that will make them better people, that will make them more disciplined, make them better students, make their whole experience at McNary more worthwhile. We want to win and we want to be competitive but we can’t forget that really we’re all in it for the same reason, just to give the kids a good experi- ence here.” KEIZERTIMES/Derek Wiley McNary freshman Junior Walling pressures North Medford quarterback Javan Gail in the second half of a 38-17 loss on Friday, Oct. 21. 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