SILVERDALE — A heavy dose of Klahowya running back Hunter Wallis, coupled with numerous injuries and a couple of academic-related absences were too much for Port Townsend to overcome in a 51-16 defeat.
“He’s just tough,” Port Townsend coach Patrick Gaffney said of Wallis. “[Friday night], he was the best player on the field. He runs hard. We were down four starters going into the game and then we lost Tanner Woodley to an ankle injury.”
The Redhawks were missing two cornerbacks, their starting and backup defensive tackle and lost Woodley, a safety and running back.
Port Townsend trailed 37-0 in the third quarter before Noa Montoya found Murphy Klemann for a 65-yard touchdown pass.
“Murphy had another long one,” Gaffney said. “Last week, it was from about 85 yards and tonight about 65 yards. He has the potential. He had three shots at long scores last night.”
Wes Blue, normally an offensive and defensive lineman for the Redhawks was pressed into duty at fullback, due to Port Townsend’s injury woes and scored the other Redhawks touchdown.
“We were out of running backs last night,” Gaffney said. “Tanner was in for Jerome [Reaux Jr.] at running back and when he went down we a had a backup lineman in and we had to play Wes at fullback. He ran hard and did a good job, but when you take your best lineman off the line there’s going to be some drop off.”
Gaffney said freshman Ryan Popp came on in relief of Woodley at safety and made a big play.
“He ended up going in when Woodley got hurt and he got a pick and ran it back to about the 1-yard line,” Gaffney said.
Port Townsend (1-3, 3-4) hosts Chimacum (2-3, 2-6) in the Quimper Quarrel at Memorial Field at 6:30 p.m. Friday.
Sequim 14, Hoquiam 12
Sequim’s Garrett Hoesel (10) is hauled down by a Hoquiam defender Friday night in Sequim. (Michael Dashiell/Olympic Peninsula News Group)
SEQUIM — The Wolves had a pair of dramatic defensive stops in the final two minutes to hold on for a 14-12 nonleague win over the Evergreen 1A’s Hoquiam Grizzlies.
“They’re the toughest team we’ve played all year,” said Wolves coach Erik Wiker. “I think they’d beat North Kitsap by 30.”
Wiker described the game as a “practice playoff” contest, as both teams are playoff-caliber teams (Hoquiam is second in the very tough Evergreen 1A League).
“It was the kind of game where they had to do a scouting report on us and we had to do a scouting report on them. It helps us practise for the playoffs,” Wiker said.
Sequim was clinging to a 14-12 lead late thanks to a Taig Wiker 1-yard touchdown run and a 70-yard pass from Wiker to Michael Young.
The Grizzlies drove down deep into Sequim territory, then on a run by Hoquiam’s quarterback Dane McMillan, the Wolves’ defense knocked him out of bounds on the two-inch line and forced a turnover on downs.
The Wolves got the ball but were force to punt. Wiker said McMillan, whom he described as a mobile Russell Wilson type quarterback, made a number of great passes to drive the Grizzlies down to the goal-line again in the final seconds.
With 20 seconds left in the game and Hoquaim mere inches away from victory, the Wolves’ defensive line of Brandon Barnett, Isaiah Cowan and Caleb Pozernik made a big push on a run play, forcing a fumble. Taig Wiker jumped on the ball in the end zone for a touchback, sealing the win.
“Taig was the beneficiary of those three guys,” said coach Wiker.
Taig Wiker finished with 10 completions in 14 attempts for 160 yards. He also carried the ball 19 times for 75 yards. Young caught three passes for 102 yards.
Coach Wiker said the blocking was excellent on on Taig and Young’s big touchdown pass, a rollout play.
The playoff-bound Wolves have one important league game left and could finish in a three-way tie atop the Olympic League 2A Division or tied for third. Sequim (4-1, 7-1) hosts Bremerton (3-2, 5-3) at 6:30 p.m. Friday for their final regular-season game. If the Wolves win, they will finish first or second in the league depending on the results of the North Kitsap (5-0) and Olympic (4-1) game.
“We have to take care of our business,” Wiker said.
Sequim 14, Hoquiam 12
Hoquiam 0 6 0 6— 12
Sequim 8 0 6 0— 14
First Quarter
S—Wiker 1 run (Wiker run)
Second Quarter
H—McMillian (run failed)
Third Quarter
S—Young 70 pass from Wiker (Cowan kick)
Fourth Quarter
H—Brown 1 run (failed)
Individual Stats
Rushing—S: Wiker 19-75, Ward 10-28, Young 2-4.
Passing—S: Wiker 10-14-160, TD.
Receiving— S: Young 3-102, Eaton 3-22, Hoesel 2-19, Moore 1-15, Ward 1-2.
Chimacum 20, Vashon 13
PORT TOWNSEND — The Cowboys’ defense came up big in their second win of the year, 20-13 over Vashon.
“They came to play a pyhysical game with us. They should’ve checked with other teams first because we’re a very tough team,” coach Chris Storm said.
Storm said the defense made some big stops. One of the best plays was by nose guard Chris Fair, who made a one-handed interception on a screen pass and nearly ran the ball in for a touchdown. He got tackled just short of the goal-line, but the Cowboys were able to punch it in for a score on offense.
Storm said Kyle Caldwell had sacks on back-to-back plays on offense.
The Cowboys got their three touchdowns from Anson Jones, Carson McConnell and Henry Brebberman.
“Clayton [Smith] had a good game. Our line played very well,” Storm said.
McConnell, one of only three seniors on the team, had a big game on defense knocking down some of Vashon’s passes.
The Cowboys have their final league game next week against Port Townsend in what should be an interesting match-up. Chimacum beat Klahowya earlier this season and Klahowya handled the Redhawks on Friday.
Storm said if Chimacum (2-3, 2-6) can beat the Redhawks (1-3, 3-4), that will give the Cowboys the best record of any of the public schools in the Olympic 1A/Niqually League, which is dominated by private schools.
Neah Bay 44, Crescent 12
NEAH BAY — Neah Bay got three touchdowns from Toby Croy and clamped down on defense against Crescent in a 44-12 win.
“We only had one or two turnovers. We definitely won the turnover battle,” said Neah Bay coach TJ Greene.
Demond Vitalis recovered two fumbles for Neah Bay, while Anthony Magrum and Captain Claplanhoo recovered fumbles for the Red Devils.
“The defense really stepped up in this game. Crescent has some weapons. In every game I’ve seen them play, they can put points on the board and we held them to two scores,” Greene said.
Andre Greene also forced some of those fumbles, coach Greene said. And Darrin Horejsi played well filling in at linebacker while Logan Halttunen had a good game at defense end, coach Greene said.
After not being happy with the Red Devils’ defense in some games this year, “we’re hoping to build on this for next week” in a big league game against Lummi, Greene said.
Greene said the Loggers contained Croy, who is averaging more than 200 yards a game, for much of the game, but Croy was able to break through for some big runs late.
Croy had touchdown runs of 12 and 27 yards and a 12-yard catch for a touchdown from Meric Soeneke.
“His speed to the outside was really tough,” Loggers coach Brian Shimko said of Croy.
“We knew exactly what they were going to run but our safeties didn’t fill, our linebackers played too close to the line and didn’t have time to react. We knew they would run dives and also dump it to the outside. That’s on us as coaches.
“Neah Bay has improved tremendously since the first time we played them, their line was blocking outstanding.”
Soeneke had two touchdown passes, the other one being a 17-yard pass to Nicholas Steeves. He added a 1-yard TD run.
Robert Richardson also had an 81-yard touchdown run.
Brayden Emery had a 16-yard TD run for Crescent. Eric Emery had a 23-yard touchdown pass to Brenton Dalton.
As always, Crescent gives the Red Devils a tough game, Greene said.
“Coach Shimko does an excellent job. We really appreciate the job he’s done,” he said.
Shimko said his team played too sloppy of a game to beat Neah Bay.
“It was a terrible game for us in terms of fumbles (7), bad snaps (five) and penalties (10),” Shimko said. “And two of those penalties brought back touchdowns for us and we weren’t able to get those scores back.”
Returning for the Red Devils from a broken arm was talented freshman Zandel Aguirre. Josey Tyree, who has also been injured for Neah Bay, is hopeful for returning against Lummi.
The Red Devils (4-1, 6-1) play at Lummi (3-1, 6-2) at 7 p.m. Friday. The Red Devils beat Lummi earlier this season in a nonleague game, but Lummi played undefeated Naselle very tough this weekend, losing 40-26.
Crescent (1-3, 3-5) hosts Darrington at 1:30 p.m. Saturday.
North Kitsap 42, Port Angeles 6
POULSBO — The Roughriders couldn’t contain Vikings sophomore Colton Bower who ran for two touchdowns, threw for another and intercepted and returned a Port Angeles pass for another score — all in the first half.
The Riders (0-5, 0-8) will wrap their season with a road game at North Mason (0-5, 2-7) at 6:30 p.m. Friday.
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Compiled from team reports. Email scores to sports@peninsuladailynews.com or phone 360-417-3525.
