SPARTA, Ill. — If Saxony Lutheran learned anything from Friday’s 36-30 overtime loss to the Sparta Bulldogs, coach O.J. Turner hopes they better understand that “every play counts.”
“I think they need to understand it’s when you got somebody down, you keep them down,” Turner said. “We’re a young team, and everybody’s going to see some opportunities that if they just worked a little bit harder, they could end this game pretty early. All the kids, after the game was over, realized that really ‘playing the whole game,’ when we say that, this is a good look at exactly what that means.”
Friday’s game was a seesaw affair from the start, but the Bulldogs (2-1) never led until the final touchdown.
“When the wheels start to fall off, they really kind of start to fall off for us,” Turner said. “But this was our first time dealing with some heavy adversity towards the end of the game, and just really how you handle it. How do you stop it? How do you regroup?”
After tying the score at 30-30 with a touchdown and a two-point conversion on its final drive in regulation, Sparta sealed the victory with a 2-yard touchdown run from junior quarterback Dariontez Monroe to set the final margin.
“They had a very good quarterback,” Turner said. “We made him look a lot better than he is, but he’s a good quarterback. I don’t want to take anything away from him. But we did not do a really good job of getting much of a pass rush on him, and allowed him really to do whatever he wanted to do. He’s a fast, athletic lefty that we had trouble tackling for sure.”
The Crusaders (2-1) took an early lead, going up 16-0 on a 3-yard run from senior Alex Buerck, who added a two-point conversion, and a 10-yard scoring pass from quarterback Kai McDowell to Zach Roth, with McDowell adding a second conversion run.
Late in the second quarter, Monroe capped a short drive with a 6-yard touchdown run, then passed for a conversion to close the gap to 16-8. The Bulldogs then forced a turnover on downs and tied the score on a 30-yard pass from Monroe to Eian Wallace.
Just before the half, the Crusaders regained the lead as Ozzie Turner hauled in a 5-yard scoring pass from McDowell to make it 23-16.
“[Sparta] has some pretty athletic kids and then some pretty just nice-sized kids,” Turner said. “I think we matched up with them fine. Honestly, it was just a game where there were a lot of mistakes, really from both teams. They had a lot of fumbles. We had a handful of fumbles. Probably the biggest thing that our coaching staff really wanted is just, maturity-wise, when things get a little tense, our guys need to just learn to kind of put our opponent away. And that was something we did not do a good job of.”
In the second half, Saxony continued to struggle, adding another touchdown, but giving Sparta the opportunity to mount a comeback that eventually forced overtime.
“No excuses, you know,” Turner said. “Sparta played hard and stuck in there the whole time, but I think this is a great learning lesson for our kids to understand that absolutely every play counts. Now they understand that more thoroughly.” McDowell completed 22-of-31 passing attempts for 257 yards and two touchdowns, and ran 14 times for another 52.
Buerck led the Crusaders on the ground, rushing 22 times for 147 yards and two touchdowns. Ozie Turner had seven catches for 83 yards and a touchdown, Cortez Madden had four catches for 70 yards, Gaebler had six catches for 36 yards and a touchdown, Buerck had two catches for 38 yards, Jaron Anderson had 1 for 14, and Alan Rudd was 1-4.
The Crusaders have a bit of a break before they try to get back on track, remaining idle this week before hosting Marquette Catholic (2-1) of Alton, Ill. Kickoff is scheduled for 7 p.m. at Houck Stadium in Cape Girardeau.
