Kickapoo/LaFarge rumbles past Silver Eagles
Brady Ambrose/Times Press
Coming off a big 32-12 homecoming win over North Crawford last Friday, the Weston Silver Eagles suffered a setback as coach Marty Richards and his team were beaten 48-12 at Kickapoo/LaFarge.
The Panthers jumped out to a 34-0 lead as Ben Lepke rushed for 178 yards on 17 carries and the Panthers finished with 307 yards rushing in the game, while holding Weston to just 46 yards on 30 carries. Richards said that Kickapoo/LaFarge is a good team who recently switched their entire offensive scheme. "Kickapoo-LaFarge is a good football team, we struggled with their run game and they recently made a change from the spread offense that they ran the first 5 games of the year to the Wing-T offense and have very good personnel for the power run game." The panthers jumped out early as Lepke scored from 55 yards out on the opening drive of the game at the 11:43 mark. Kickapoo/LaFarge went up 12-0 on a touchdown catch by Jordan Greenland from 19 yards out, and made it 18-0 when Greenland hauled in his second touchdown pass from Matt Hatfield from 16 yards out with a little over two minutes left in the first quarter.
Sitting on top of a comfortable lead, the Panthers ate up much of the second quarter and took a 26-0 lead when Greenland scored his third straight touchdown on a 19 yard run with 6:31 left in the first half. Hatfield hit Colton Heading three minutes later with Kickapoo's fifth score of the first half to give the Panthers a 34-0 lead.
The Silver Eagles finally got on the board when Caleb Arneson scored from a yard out with three seconds left to make the halftime score 34-6. Richards added "Kickapoo has 12 seniors and it was obvious that they were more physical and showed a speed we struggled with. They did a very nice job in all aspects of the game. They outplayed us in most all aspects of the game including defense. Our young linemen did not respond well and Kickapoo was much more aggressive than we were."
The Weston passing game proved to be a bright spot of the night, as Caleb Arneson and David Klang put on an impressive performance. Arneson five of seven passes for 147 yards and Klang caught caught four of those passes for 146 yards, or 36.5 yards per catch. "David Klang and Caleb Arneson were working extremely well together, David has played very well all year long on offense and defense," added the coach.
Klang hauled in a 69 yard strike from Arneson at the 7:26 mark in the third quarter for Weston's final score of the game, and the Panthers closed the door when Kurtus Mueller scored from 29 yards out for the 48-12 final. "We are also showing the effects of the injury bug that has started to seriously affect us," said Richards. "With two starters gone on offense and defense we lost Senior Taylor Seep to a concussion early in the game."
Up next for Weston will be a non-conference game with Shullsburg, and Richards hopes his team will respond well after the loss. "Our young men need to come out aggressively from the start to the end of the game. Shullsburg is a physical team from a very tough conference, they primarily want to run the ball but also have an impressive passing game. We need to come out and be physical from the start, our young men need to get back to the confidence level we played with a week ago and continue to improve on our technique from where we were after the North Crawford game. We also need a couple of young men to step up their level of play and take over the void left by the injuries to the three starters that we have lost on both sides of the ball," coach added. The Miners are 3-3 and are coming off a 49-14 loss to Potosi Friday night.