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Spring Valley stifles Hurley offense

SPRING VALLEY, Wis.— No. 3-seed Hurley did not get a treat in its Halloween visit to No. 2 Spring Valley, losing 41-14 in Friday’s WIAA Division 6 Level 2 playoff game.

The Cardinals were too fast and their passing game too good as the Midgets’ offense struggled with poor field position, false start penalties and yet another key injury, this time to senior Jake Tenlen, right off the bat.

“Bottom line is we didn’t hold the ball long enough tonight to keep them off the field,” Hurley coach Scott Erickson said. “You want to make it a six-possession game and we weren’t able to do that.”

Hurley finished the season at 8-3, champions of the Great Western Conference. Spring Valley (9-2) goes to No. 1 Athens in a state quarterfinal next week.

“It was a very good season,” Erickson said. “We won a Great Western title, which I think is a fantastic accomplishment any year for teams in our league. The win at Forest Park was huge, really got us going. As the year stretched on, we started having a few injuries. Your depth really gets put to the test. It was pretty good to go 8-3 with some of the injuries we sustained, but that’s only because our kids believe in winning, believe in the program. I’m very happy with their effort all year.”

The Midgets started the game the way they wanted to: A 13-play, 74-yard drive that ended with a one-yard touchdown run for Cole Huotari with 5:09 left in the first quarter. Up 6-0, Hurley followed that drive by forcing Spring Valley into a three-and-out.

“They’re a tough offense to prepare for and, really, they came out and got us on our heels early,” Spring Valley coach Ryan Kapping said.

But trouble was already looming for Hurley.

Tenlen injured his shoulder on an 18-yard catch from James Sukanen that set Hurley up inside the 20 on the opening drive. Tenlen was Sukanen’s top target and a safety in Hurley’s already shorthanded defense. The Cardinals took advantage in the passing game, ending up with 150 yards and three touchdowns through the air.

“It really doesn’t help when you lose your starting safety in your first possession on offense,” Erickson said. “You’re already down your strong safety (Mitchell Maki). Those are our speed guys in the back end, too, so now we’ve got some inexperience back there. We had to move Ronnie Nickel to safety; he hasn’t played a whole lot there this year. We had Kris Bluse, a sophomore, playing strong safety.”

After the Midgets went three-and-out, Spring Valley pulled ahead with its first points of the night. Remington Schneider threw a six-yard pass to Jed Schlegel and Logan Newton’s extra point made it 7-6 early in the second quarter.

After that, it looked like it was going to be a defensive battle. Hurley punted three times in the second quarter, Spring Valley once. The Midgets were constantly backed against a wall; they took possession inside the 30 every time in the quarter and one drive included a false start penalty.

“We had some stops early on, but we shot ourselves in the foot a little bit with penalties, and field position coming off kick returns really was a crippler tonight,” Erickson said.

The Cardinals took momentum by scoring twice in the final 3:09 of the first half on a pair of 52-yard passes from Schneider, one to Newton, the second to Schlegel. That made it 21-6 at the half. After Spring Valley went ahead 14-6, Hurley’s drive ended fast, as Sukanen was sacked and a false start penalty pushed the Midgets back. That gave Spring Valley the ball back with less than two minutes left and were able to score and take a two-touchdown lead into halftime.

“Our kids just settled in,” Kapping said. “We stressed this week, we can’t get up the field, we have to play flat at the line of scrimmage, try to take away trap, which is really their best play and then go from there. The kids just did a good job all night of playing at the line of scrimmage and making plays.”

The Cardinals got the ball first in the second half. It took six plays before Newton ran 25 yards for a touchdown. Spring Valley possessed a commanding 28-6 lead.

Spring Valley added two more scores before Hurley was able to reach the end zone in the fourth quarter on a three-yard run by Huotari, his second touchdown of the day. Adam Hendricks ran in the two-point conversion to pull Hurley within 41-14.

Spring Valley’s Northland Pines-like speed made its passing game better. The Cardinals ran for 183 yards and passed for 150.

“They have four really quick guys, so you have to get to the quarterback,” Erickson said. “Sometimes we got there, but he’s pretty quick and elusive, too. He had some pretty good throws.”

Kapping said, “We’re pretty balanced offensively. I thought we did some things running the ball, but we knew we had good edge players. We have all year. We were able to get some matchups that we liked and get some points through the air.”

He took over as coach last year for the Cardinals, which made the playoffs then and lost 26-21 at Hurley in the first round. The team looked to win a couple of playoff games this year and it did that.

Hurley would have liked to have played this game in Hurley, where it snowed Friday. That type of slippery track would have helped the Midgets and taken away Spring Valley’s speed advantage. The weather was too perfect in Spring Valley - just cold, not wet - and Hurley’s season ended.

Hurley 6 0 0 8 — 14

Spring Valley 0 21 14 6 — 41

First Quarter

Hur — Cole Huotari 1 run (run failed), 5:09

Second Quarter

SV — Jed Schlegel 6pass from Remington Schneider (Logan Newton kick), 11:19

SV — Logan Newton 52 pass from Schneider (Newton kick), 3:09

SV — Schlegel 52 pass from Schneider (Newton kick), 1:23

Third Quarter

SV — Newton 25 run (Newton kick), 8:56

SV — Ben Fesenmaier 1 run (Newton kick), 5:28

Fourth Quarter

SV — Schneider 26 run (kick blocked), 8:50

Hur — Huotari 3 run (Adam Hendricks run), 2:23

Hur SV

First downs 9 8

Rushes-yards 41-150 31-183

Comp-Att-Int 5-12-1 5-12-0

Passing 73 150

Total yards 223 333

Fumbles-lost 0-0 0-0

Penalties-yards 7-50 3-15

Individual

Rushing — Spring Valley, Matt Fesenmaier 18-64, Remington Schneider 6-32, No. Logan Newton 2-36, Jed Schlegel 2-4, Jacob Rielly, 1-38, Devin Larson 1-5, Brock Bune 1-4. Hurley – Jacob Saari, 12-40, Nick Fink 5-2, Cole Huotari 16-71, James Sukanen 5-8, Ronnie Nickel 1-0, Kris Bluse 2-29.

Passing — Spring Valley, Remintgon Schneider, 5-12-1-150. Hurley, James Sukanen 5-12-1-73.

Receiving — Spring Valley, Jed Schlegel 3-75, Logan Newton 2-75. Hurley, Jake Tenlen 1-19, Tandrell Foster 1-22, Erik Barker, 1-28.

 
 
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