Midgets win 9th straight Border Bowl

IRONWOOD - For Hurley, eight was great, but nine straight Border Bowl wins over Ironwood was even better as the Midgets rolled over the Red Devils 48-6 on a soggy Longyear Field Friday night.

The series began in 1919 and the two ancient rivals have met 82 times on the gridiron. Ironwood still leads the long series 48-31-3 but has not defeated Hurley since 2005, when they went to the state quarterfinals that year.

Ironwood pulled within 14-6 at the end of the first quarter, but Hurley scored three touchdowns off three Red Devil turnovers to take control of the game, 28-6.

Hurley coach Scott Erickson said he thought Hurley wore out Ironwood.

"We have a lot of interchangeable parts and we even have two good quarterbacks we can rotate in," Erickson said. "They came at us, but they have a lot of kids going both ways. We wore them down over time. And we didn't have any turnovers."

Ironwood coach Dan Niemi said Ironwood played well at times but let the game get away from them.

"We had a good game plan going in," Niemi said. "We wanted to stop their trap play, but we didn't stay disciplined. Our offense and defense looked good at times. Our passing game was working nice and we made it 14-6 and had them on their heels and (Ryan) Broemer had two sacks in a row and then our defensive end sucked in and the quarterback ran for a TD. We need to focus on the mental part of the game.

"But the kids have a great attitude and learned a lot. They are hungry to get better."

The Midgets have started the season 2-0 the last five seasons in a row and Erickson said there is a reason for the fast starts.

"We believe in doing things our way and the right way," Erickson said. "We execute and don't give games away. We're 2-0 looking to go 3-0. We only have four conference games, so we have to win. We have a big conference game this week against Lake Linden and it's our first home game."

The Hurley defense stuffed Ironwood's offense on a three-and-out to start the game and on its first play from scrimmage, Jake Tenlen ran a play-action pass and found Mitchell Maki 12 yards behind the secondary. He hit him in stride for a 72-yard score at the 10:10 mark. The extra point pass was incomplete and the Midgets led 6-0.

After an Ironwood quarterback snap was recovered by Matt Christoferson, Hurley marched 48 yards for another score. The highlights of the drive were a long run of 20-yards by Maki and quarterback James Sukanen zipped a 17-yard completion to Tandrell Foster.

Sukonen scored on a four-yard quarterback keeper with 2:56 left in the first quarter. Devin Czerneski ran in the extra point to give the Midgets a 14-0 advantage.

But Ironwood responded by going on its best drive of the night and discovering its passing attack. Lefty Denver Sharrow fired two passes down the middle to Jared Sobolewski for gains of 18 and 11 yards and then threw a slant pass to wide-out Zach Combs for 24 yards. Ironwood set up a nice screen pass to Brody Stefonich for 11 yards and then Stefonich plunged into the end zone from two yards out with no time remaining in the first quarter. The extra point kicked was blocked and the Midget lead shrunk to 14-6.

But once again, the Devils turned the ball over on a fumble after getting good field position.

It took Hurley only three plays to score from 51 yards out. The Midgets had been running their patented trap and off-tackle plays, but this time Tenlen made the two fakes, put the ball on his hip and scampered 36 yards for a score. The defense was completely fooled and never laid a hand on Tenlen. With 7:51 remaining in the second quarter, Hurley upped its lead to 20-6.

On Ironwood's next series Hurley's Cole Huotari intercepted a tipped pass and returned it down to the Ironwood three-yard line. He ran in the score on the next play and Tenlen took in the extra point run.

After converting three Red Devil turnovers for three TDs, the Midgets went up 28-6 with 6:33 left. After a punt interference penalty against Ironwood, Hurley had a seven-play, 40-yard drive with Tenlen hiding the pigskin again and scoring from eight yards out. Maki's extra point kick made it 35-6 with 2:49 left in quarter two.

After Hurley's Nick Fink returned the second-half kickoff to the 50, Czerneski ripped off a 29-yard run on the trap and Sukanen found Maki in the corner of the south end zone on a 20-yard toss with 9:46 remaining. Maki converted the extra point to make it 42-6 and running clock kicked in for the rest of the game.

The Midgets scored one last time in the fourth quarter on a 15-yard off-tackle run by Ronnie Nickel with 11:18 left.

"Our defense was solid," Erickson said. "They had some good passes, but one TD sure isn't terrible. I really like the way this team plays."

Czerneski led all rushers with 80 yards on seven carries from his fullback spot. Hurley was also a perfect 4-4 with Sukanen hitting pinpoint throws (3-3) for 45 yards. Maki had three catches for 100 yards.

Sharrow led the Red Devil rushing attack with seven carries for 23 yards. Stefonich had only 17-yards but did some hard running on the inside.

Sharrow was 5 for 14 passing for 67-yards and one interception.

Stefonich was Ironwood's leading tackler with seven.

Hurley (2-0) jumps into Great Western Conference action by hosting Lake Linden on Friday at 6:30 p.m.

The Red Devils (0-1) will be at home again against Washburn in a non-conference game on Friday at 7 p.m.

Hurley 14 21 7 6 - 48

Ironwood 6 0 0 0 - 6

First Quarter

Hur - Mitchell Maki 72 pass from Jake Tenlen (pass failed), 10:10

Hur - James Sukanen 4 run (Devin Czerneski run), 2:56

Iwd - Brody Stefonich 2 run (kick failed), :00

Second Quarter

Hur - Tenlen 36 run (run failed), 7:51

Hur - Cole Huotari 3 run (Tenlen run), 6:33

Hur - Tenlen 8 run (Maki kick), 2:49

Third Quarter

Hur - Maki 20 pass from Sukanen (Maki kick), 9:46

Fourth Quarter

Hur - Ronnie Nickel 15 run (kick failed), 11:18

Hur Iwd

First downs 11 11

Rushes-yards 34-227 33-89

Comp-Att-Int 4-4-0 6-15-1

Passing 117 78

Total yards 344 167

Fumbles-lost 1-0 5-3

Penalties-yards 4-20 7-42

Individual statistics

Rushing - Hurley, Mitchell Maki 3-37, Devin Czerneski 7-80, Nick Fink 3-11, James Sukanen 4-minus 7, Cole Huotari 3-11, Jake Tenlen 2-44, Adam Hendricks 3-25, Ronnie Nickel 3-26, Kris Bluse 3-2. Ironwood, Shane Buckley 10-21, Brody Stefonich 8-17, Denver Sharrow 7-23, Desmond Sackmann 2-minus 3, Devon DeRosso 4-21, Jordan Giannunzio 2-10.

Passing - Hurley James Sukanen 3-3-45-0, Jake Tenlen, 1-1-72-0. Ironwood, Denver Sharrow 5-14-67-1, Desmond Sackmann, 1-1-11-0.

Receiving - Hurley, Mitchell Maki 3-100, Tandrell Foster 1-17. Ironwood, Jacob DiGiorgio 1-11, Brody Stefonich, 2-23, Jared Sobolewski 2-28, Zach Combs 1-16.