Thursday, 11.6.14ON THE WEB: www.yankton.net
SPORTS DEPARTMENT: [email protected] PRESS DAKOTANP A G E 9
sports
BY JEREMY [email protected]
When the Harrisburg Tigersand Yankton Bucks meet for achance to move on to the statechampionship game, there willbe no shortage of connectionsbetween the two programs.
From the players on the fieldto the coaches on the sidelines,Friday night’s Class 11AA semifi-nal game at Crane-YoungworthField has special significance fora select group.
• Harrisburg standout run-ning back Jonathan Kabambiwas in the Yankton School Dis-trict through seventh grade.
• On the sidelines, Tigers’ de-fensive coordinator David Dohnis married to Trisha (Thunker)Dohn, whose brother Mike Thun-ker was a standout receiver forthe Bucks.
• Tyler Muth, the offensiveline coach for Harrisburg, is thebrother of Yankton assistantBrady Muth.
• And then there’s Harrisburghead coach Brandon White, whoplayed football at the Universityof South Dakota — as did Yank-ton assistant Marc Murtha.
Even though he has coachedagainst Yankton teams since themiddle school ranks, it’s stillmeaningful to face his formerprogram, according to TylerMuth.
“Obviously this one is a lotmore important,” said Muth, a2002 Yankton High School gradu-ate.
Kabambi, of course, is thefocal point.
The 5-foot-11, 208-pound run-ning back has rushed for 1,286yards and 21 touchdowns thisseason for Harrisburg.
“No doubt about it, as hegoes, our team goes,” coachWhite said this week.
Kabambi burst onto thestatewide scene last seasonwhen he ran for nearly 1,000yards with five touchdowns as ajunior.
“He was pretty raw as a fresh-man and sophomore; not a tonof football IQ, but the last twoyears he’s really come into hisown,” White said.
After opening some eyes at aNorth Dakota State camp thispast summer, Kabambi hastaken his game to another level,his coach said. Kabambi has notyet decided on a college, buthe’s likely to be playing on Satur-days, his coach said.
“He understands where the
Local Connections Highlight 11AA Semifinal Tilt
JAMES D. CIMBUREK/P&DYankton's Tim Cross, left, Colton Diefenderfer, 43, and Jordan Lightner wrap up Harrisburg'sJonathan Kabambi during their regular season game Oct. 17 at Crane-Youngworth Field.11AA | PAGE 10
Yankton Hosts Harrisburg Friday For Spot In Title Game
Neb. High School Football Playoffs
Eagles Swat Bees 60-20D1: CreightonMoves On ToQuarterfinals
BY JAMES D. [email protected]
SHICKLEY, Neb. — TheBruning-Davenport-ShickleyEagles jumped out to an earlylead and pulled away, beatingBloomfield 60-20 in the sec-ond round of the NebraskaClass D1 football playoffs onWednesday.
Bloomfield finishes with a7-3 record. BDS will take a 9-1record into a quarterfinalmatchup with Heartland onTuesday.
“Credit BDS. They’re atough team,” said Bloomfieldhead coach Matt Kuchar. “Wedidn’t get off to a good start,and it snowballed fromthere.”
BDS co-coach Chris Ardis-sono said the Eagles havingits full lineup, possibly for thefirst time this season, playeda key factor.
“We’ve had a lot of in-juries,” he said. “We play somuch better, so much moretogether, when we have ourtop eight.”
BDS led 30-0 after onequarter, with Eagles QB GrantNorder passing for twotouchdowns and rushing foranother. Kale Kleinschmidtscored for BDS on the open-ing drive. Norder passes toT.J. Krupicka and Chris Rohr,and Norder’s 31-yard keeperstretched the lead.
“We got a lot of breaks inthe first quarter,” said BDSco-coach Mark Rotter. “Wehad it in our minds that,when we got our breaks, wehad to make the most ofthem. I just thought it wouldbe in the third or fourth quar-ter.”
Bloomfield got its initialfirst down of the game earlyin the second quarter, withQuinn O’Brien’s 28-yard catchsetting up an O’Brien keeper.
But BDS answered quicklywith another Norder TD run.Kleinschmit followed with a49-yard fumble recovery for atouchdown. Another fumbleand recovery by Kleinschmitset up another Norder toRohr connection for a score,making it 52-8.
“Kleinschmit is a sopho-more, but he plays like a sen-ior,” Rotter said. “He washuge last week as well.”
BY BRUCE VIERGUTZFor the Press & Dakotan
NELIGH, Neb. — Creightonhad to put in a full day ofwork for one of the rare timesin a football game in the pasttwo years.
Lunch pail in hand, theBulldogs earned a 50-35 blue-collar victory in Class D1 Ne-braska state high schoolsecond-round action Wednes-day night a Warrior Field.
Creighton, 10-0, will hostElm Creek Tuesday eveningin quarterfinal action.
The Bulldogs had playedjust two previous games thepast two seasons in whichthey had to compete for fourquarters.
After trailing 14-0 early on,it was apparent this wouldn’tbe a jog in the park.
“We kind of started thegame wide-eyed and shell-shocked,” Creighton coachJeff Jensen said. “A couple ofweeks ago we got into a gamewhere it took us a while toscore. We’re just not used toplaying full games and areused to things being easy.”
Thanks to Bulldogs’ run-ning back Reid Liska, thingsweren’t as hard as they couldhave been.
Liska carried the ball 36times for 278 yards, includingtouchdown runs of 68 and 30yards to help the Bulldogsavoid the upset.
Tied at 22-all, the Bulldogsscored on a 1-yard touch-down bolt by Lane Waltonwith 22 seconds left in thefirst half, then tacked onLiska’s 30-yard score to takea 36-22 advantage.
The Warriors (6-4) an-swered with a potent passingattack all game and pulledwith in 36-29 on a 9-yard runby sophomore quarterbackGrant White with 5:13 left inthe third quarter.
White, a 2,000-yard passerfor the season, completed 21of 42 passes for 255 yardsand one interception.
Creighton got its runninggame in full throttle when re-serve running back RyanNeumann added touchdownruns of 13 and one yard tohelp keep Neligh-Oakdale atbay.
A 35-yard pass from White
BDS StingsBees In D1
PlayoffsABOVE: Bloomfield's CodyBeckmann, left, looks for run-ning room against the Bruning-Davenport-Shickley defenseduring their Class D1 second-round game on Wednesday inShickley, Nebraska.
RIGHT: Bloomfield's Cody Beck-mann, 24, picks off a pass in-tended for BDS' Riley Tegtmeier,5, during the first half of theirClass D1 second-round playofffootball game on Wednesday inShickley, Nebraska.
PHOTOS BY JAMES D. CIMBU-REK/P&D
BEES | PAGE 10
RANDOLPH, Neb. — Cortney Ark-feld and Kristie Bruening combinedfor 28 kills as the Wynot Blue Devilsswept Bancroft-Rosalie 25-17, 25-23,25-22 in Tuesday’s Sub-District D2-3championship in Randolph.
The win sends Wynot (22-9) totonight’s (Thursday) District D2-2final against Stuart, to be played inPlainview.
Arkfeld recorded 15 kills, twoblocks, two ace serves and 14 digsin the win, while Bruening had 13kills. Jenna Heine recorded 30 setassists and 14 digs, and OliviaWieseler led the defense with 15digs.
No stats were reported for Ban-croft-Rosalie.BANCROFT-ROSALIE (13-23) 17 23 22WYNOT (22-9) 25 25 25
Wynot 3, Winside 0RANDOLPH, Neb. — Cortney Arkfeld recorded
11 kills to lead the Wynot Blue Devils past Winside25-17, 25-10, 25-19 in semifinal action Tuesday atthe Sub-District D2-3 tournament in Randolph.
Kristie Bruening added eight kills, while CarissaKuchta had six kills. Jenna Heine recorded 23 setassists and 27 digs.
No stats were reported for Winside (14-18).WINSIDE (14-18) 17 10 19WYNOT 25 25 25
Volleyball: WynotWins Sub-District
CREIGHTON | PAGE 10
Rodgers Back After Bye, But Pack Guards HurtingGREEN BAY, Wis. (AP) — A bye
week gave Packers quarterbackAaron Rodgers some much-neededtime to rest a sore hamstring.
The injury news isn’t as promis-ing for two beefy guys who protectRodgers in the pocket.
Starting guards Josh Sitton andT.J. Lang each sat out practiceWednesday with injuries sufferedthe last time the Packers played, a44-23 loss at New Orleans on Oct.26. Sitton and Lang are the Packers’best offensive linemen, and thelongest-tenured players on whatcoach Mike McCarthy considersone of best front fives in his nineseasons in Green Bay.
Now, there are questions aboutthe line going into Sunday night’sNFC North showdown against theChicago Bears.
“The best offensive lines in myopinion are the ones that play weekin and week out. The timing, thecommunication, particularly thenon-verbal communication, hap-pens so fast at the line of scrim-mage, so it’s definitely a big part ofthe flow of your offense,” McCarthysaid.
Lang was carted off the field inNew Orleans with a left ankle in-jury. Sitton said he may have torn a
ligament in his leftbig toe in the sec-ond half of thesame game, but gut-ted it out throughthe end.
“First few days,it was prettyswollen and prettysore. So it’s come along way,” said Sitton, the leftguard.
How Sitton and Lang respond totreatment the next few days will betelling about whether they will beavailable Sunday.
At least the Packers got Rodgersback for the first full practice afterthe bye. Rodgers, who tweaked hishamstring while scrambling againstthe Saints, followed a rehab pro-gram during the off week and gotacupuncture to help with the in-jury.
McCarthy said his franchisequarterback looked good at prac-tice. Still, some dynamics havechanged since the Bears and Pack-ers last met on Sept. 28, a 38-17 winfor Green Bay at Soldier Field.
Besides the uncertainty on theline, the Bears figure to have JaredAllen back; the veteran defensivelineman missed the teams’ first
meeting with an illness. While not areal running threat, Rodgers doesrely on his mobility to help extendplays.
Asked about compensating forpotentially being without Lang andSitton or being cautious with hishamstring, Rodgers said “Well, Itake care of my body pretty well,and I trust that by Sunday that it’snot going to be an issue.
“I just have to play my game andif something happens I might dial itback a little bit,” Rodgers said.
But he’s having such a good sea-son that “dialing it back” forRodgers might mean an averageyear for anyone else.
Rodgers leads the league with a113.6 passer rating. He has thrown19 touchdowns in helping lead thePackers to a 5-3 record, which in-cluded a six-game stretch withoutan interception.
What makes the season more im-pressive is that Green Bay hasn’thad the production expected out ofthe running game with Eddie Lacyand James Starks. That in part isdue to a lack of opportunities withthe Packers’ up-tempo offense scor-ing on quick-strike drives.
While receivers Jordy Nelsonand Randall Cobb have been tortur-
ing secondaries, rookie wideout Da-vante Adams is still emerging as athird target. Also, Green Bay hasn’thad a consistent threat at tight endsince Jermichael Finley got knockedout last season by a neck injury.
“Well, it’s just about finding theright matchups for us, whateverthat might be. Jordy and Randallhave had a lot of targets go theirway. They’ve been open a lot,”Rodgers said. “But you know this isa progression offense, as the WestCoast offenses are, and I’m going togo through (them) and look for theguy that’s open.”
NOTES: The Packers did get threedefensive starters at practice withsafety Morgan Burnett (calf), corner-back Sam Shields (knee) and endDatone Jones (ankle) all returning atfull participation. Rodgers was alsoofficially listed as a full participant.... Green Bay signed guard JordanMcCray to the practice squad whilereleasing running back Michael Hill.... The team announced that is testingthe addition of 200 standing-roomonly tickets for the first time for thenext two games, against the Bearsfollowed by the Eagles. That wouldincrease Lambeau Field’s capacity to80,935. The tickets are priced at $75.
Rodgers
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