Putnam County moves to 2-0 after a win over South Harrison

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by Jeremy Benson, GrandRiverConference.com

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Last season, Putnam County was a young team that began the season with several injuries.  They struggled in their first two games, falling to Marceline and South Harrison.  The Midgets rebounded to have a winning season.  This year, they are older and healthier.  They avenged their loss to Marceline with a 42-21 victory last week.  They were looking to make it two in a row vs. South Harrison, who was the coaches' pick to win the GRC this season.

The Midgets set the tone at the start when they converted an onside kick.  However, they were stalled at the South Harrison 4-yard line.  After a South Harrison punt, Putnam County gave it back on a fumble.  South Harrison was forced to punt again.  The Midgets drove down the field and were at the 4-yard line of South Harrison as the quarter closed scoreless.

It looked like South Harrison was going to come up with another goal-line stop.  The Midgets had a 4th and goal at the 6.  Sawyer Morgan attempted a pass to Treven Riediger.  Reidiger tipped the ball, but Jacob Jones was waiting in the back of the end zone for the catch.  After a successful PAT, Putnam County led 7-0.  Putnam County Coach Adam Huse said, "Sawyer threw it a little too hard for Treven as he was coming across a little behind him.  And so it went off his hands, but Jacob had been doing a great job running his route, putting himself into position. Sometimes it's good to be lucky when you put yourself in the right position and do the right things, good things happen to you."

Boden Darling picked off Jett Cornett on South Harrison's next drive.  Putnam County began the possession at the Bulldog's 42 when Huse called for the home run ball.  Luke Aguilar beat a defender, and Morgan found him in stride for a 42-yard touchdown pass.  Putnam County took a 14-0 lead with 9:32 left in the half. Coach Huse felt that it was the right time to go for the home run saying, "If you're in that midfield range, you might as well take advantage of it.  We know the Cornett kid is the cornerback, and we hit him on the interception as well.  So I knew he had taken a little bit of a shot. They were backpedaling, and we'd hit a couple of hitches.  So we just went for it."

South Harrison had a 4th and 15 from about the Putnam 40 when Cornett found Mason Galloway on down the sideline to move the ball down to the Midgets' 8-yard line.  Galloway caught a screen pass and ran it in from the 8-yard line to cut the Midget's lead to 14-7, ending the half.

Putnam's got the ball first in the 2nd half and drove deep into Bulldog's territory again, getting to the 1-yard line.  However, a penalty pushed them back to 4th and goal at the 6-yard line.  This time, Putnam County was unable to convert.  However, Putnam intercepted Cornett again when Charley Dickerson nabbed the ball at the 40-yard line and ran it back for a touchdown.  However, a block in the back nullified the touchdown.  South Harrison could not take advantage when Morgan found Jones all alone in the end zone from 7 yards out.  The score put Putnam County up 21-7.  It was Jones' second touchdown of the game.  Coach Huse said, "He was wide open, but it took forever to find him."  Jones added, "The line did a good job giving Sawyer the time to find me on that."

The third quarter would end the score still at 21-7, but South Harrison was at the 3 to start the quarter.  Crae Coffey found the end zone on the first play in the 4th quarter to cut the Putnam County lead to 21-14.  After the Bulldogs stopped the Midgets again deep in their own territory, South Harrison had a chance to tie with 6:16 left in the game.  After a couple of first downs, Cornett was sacked to force a 4th and 18.  The Midgets stopped the Bulldogs with another sack to take over with 2:51 left.  Putnam County iced the game with an Angstrom Watt 1-yard TD run.  Putnam County came away with a 28-14 victory.

Coach Huse said after the game, "I'll be honest, I told our kids we felt a little disrespected by being the three, which I completely understand why, but we returned a lot of guys and a lot of experience."  Coach Huse was referring to the pre-season poll that had Putnam County at #3.  He went on to say, "We feel like we are going to put out a very physical football team every Friday night.  We told our kids, we want to win a conference championship.  You have to win tonight."

Huse talked about the conference race, "We felt like this is a de facto conference championship game right here, right out of the gate.  And then obviously, Brookfield is going to be another one that we're going to have to get through."

Putnam County is now 2-0 in the GRC and will host Trenton next week.  When asked how the team stays focused, Huse added, "We'll watch the film and focus on Trenton.  We won't watch much of this (tonight's) game, and pick out the little few things we need to see that we messed up or where we could have been better.  But then that focus is going to be on Trenton."

South Harrison drops to 1-1 in the GRC and will host Marceline next week in another big game.

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