First-half struggles doom Cobras

SIGOURNEY - The Mediapolis and Sigourney-Keota football teams run similar versions of the same offense. Mediapolis defended better against that spin back offense Friday in a battle for a district championship.

The visitors held the Cobras to minus 11 yards rushing in the first half and took a 21-0 lead by halftime on the way to a 28-6 victory and a playoff berth.

Mediapolis (8-1) will host Iowa City Regina (7-2) in the first round of the postseason. SK ends its season at 8-1.

'They made some nice adjustments in the second half and we were hanging on for dear life,” Mepo coach Brian Borrison said. 'I think we were poised and just got down to playing football.”

'We were shellshocked early,” SK coach Jared Jensen said. 'This was the first bad game we had all year and it happened to be against the best opponent we played. We kept shooting ourselves in the foot.”

The first SK offensive play was a penalty and that was after a SK unnecessary roughness penalty on Mepo's first possession.

Mediapolis' first score came after a face mask penalty, then a pass interference call on fourth-and-18.

A fumble and an unsportsmanlike penalty set up the second Mepo score.

'We just kept shooting ourselves in the foot, getting behind the chains, penalty after penalty,” Jensen said. 'I don't think we blocked a soul up front in the first half. We saw that they like to shoot the gaps and they did that to us. They took it to us. We couldn't get anything going.”

After a three-and-out, Mepo scored for the third time in the second quarter, just 1 minute, 7 seconds before halftime.

'We thought we could do some things to disrupt them and those first couple of three-and-outs was an affirmation of that,” Borrison said. 'To get them out of what they wanted to do was a testament to our defense.”

SK had six fumbles, losing one, but all involved a loss of yardage.

'We had some snaps go to the wrong back,” Jensen said. 'The backs catching the ball were looking up to see if somebody was there. All of that accumulated into our rhythm being completely off.”

'We knew it was going to come down to who could execute, who could do the little things,” Borrison said. 'We haven't been punched in the mouth for three weeks. They haven't been punched in the mouth yet this year. I didn't think we could hold them to one score, so that shows how well our defense played.”

The Cobras had the ball first to start the second half. The second play was an incomplete pass that had the possibility of going for a score.

'Cade (Molyneaux) knew he had to get rid of it quick and JD (Stout) was looking back at him thinking the ball was not gone,” Jensen said. 'Maybe we had not run that play enough in practice.”

The Cobras got the ball back on a Brady Duwa interception and drove for a score with Stout's 6-yard TD with 5 minutes, 28 seconds remaining in the third quarter.

'We knew 34 (Duwa) was a heck of a player, so we didn't want to throw toward him and when we did, we paid for it,” Borrison said.

Stout finished with 40 yards on 23 carries and Sam Sieren had 43 yards on 18 carries. Trent Hendricks had seven tackles and Dawson Baumert five.

'Most of the guys had pretty good attitudes at halftime,” Jensen said. 'Let's march down and put a score in and work back from there. We played better the second half, but their defense was just too much for us. Anytime you get penalties like that, it is going to kill you. We had been clean most of the year, fumble-wise and penalty-wise. It just seemed like we were not us.”

The Cobras had 94 total yards.

'That is not having any time or any holes to run through,” Jensen said. 'They were more physical than we were, coming off the ball faster and controlled the line of scrimmage.”

The Cobras were the only 8-1 team in the state not to make the playoffs. 'I think these guys deserve a lot of credit,” Jensen said of the Cobras. 'They haven't gotten the credit they deserve. We had a group that knew they were a special team. This game is not going to define our season. Our senior leadership has been huge. The dedication has been huge. And that's why we were able to play for the district championship. I had 16 seniors out here. You can't take anything away from them. Not many teams can be 8-1. A loss is a loss and it's going to hurt and it's going to sting, but we have to look at the season as a whole. I absolutely believe we are one of the best 16 teams in this class. This game might not of shown that, but I know it.”