By Jeremy McDonald
jeremymcdonald73@gmail.com
CORVALLIS, Ore.– Sprague made things interesting for themselves in their first outing of the Fall 2021 season.
They controlled the first half of their 41-20 victory Friday night on the road. Dictating the pace with their run defense and their run offense behind Riley Davis had eventually opened up the passing game for Logan Smith to connect on two of his four touchdown passes on this night as they entered the halftime break up 12-7.
Smith had found Blaise Pearson and Jordan Jeffries with both scores coming in a 90 second stretch.
“It was good because I knew if we got our blocks going good, we’ll get yards and get into a groove a little bit while working in our pass plays,” Davis said as he finished with 163 yards on 24 carries.
“Huge, huge…as a defense we need to get better. Just a bunch of penalties and things we need to get better at, but the run-stoppage and our coverage, we could get better,” Cole Elmore said.
Elmore and Davis lined up at linebacker while also were in the backfield as a fullback-running back duo as Sprague slowed Toby Worsch down in the running game. Holding the Spartan junior to 40 yards on 18 carries.
Penalties defensively kept them on the field long overdue, mix in the Carter Steeves-deep connection, it was a bad recipe as Steeves struck from 38-yards and 45-yards. The five-yard Steeves-Carson Wright strike in the third quarter to tie it at 20 had come on the heels of two defensive penalties against the Olys.
“Eyes off the backfield. We’re looking too much in the backfield looking for a sweep, we just need to man-up our man and play football,” Elmore said, now entering Week 2.
Sprague settled in. Smith hit Drew Rodriguez on back-to-back 12-yard fades as touchdowns to get the Olympians back in front by the 5:42 mark of the fourth quarter. Rodriguez tacked on a pick-six on the next defensive possession that all but sealed the three-score victory.
“After halftime, we all picked each other up and we kicked ass after half. We wanted it more and now we just got to take it on to the second game and keep it rolling,” Rodriguez said. “We got to bring the energy we brought in that second half and bring it to practice and be ready to go.”
Rodriguez had seven receptions for 81 yards and two touchdowns with a carry for 35 yards. Smith went 13-for-19 passing, throwing for 283 yards to go with four touchdowns and two interceptions with Century coming to Salem September 10 for a 7:15pm kickoff.
Photos By Jeremy McDonald
