LAKE STEVENS — Even when the Marysville-Pilchuck High School football team has the ball, in a sense they’re still playing defense.
Again relying on a deliberate, effective running attack that keeps the ball away from opposing offenses, Marysville-Pilchuck earned another impressive victory. Boosted by dominant linemen, running back Austin Denton rushed for 176 yards and a second-half touchdown to lead the Tomahawks to a 28-0 Wesco North triumph over Lake Stevens Friday.
Unbeaten M-P (4-0 in division, 6-0 overall) shut out a Lake Stevens team (2-1, 4-2) that scored 49 points last week against Jackson and hadn’t scored fewer than 35 points in a game this fall.
M-P head coach Brandon Carson joyfully praised his first-place squad after the decisive win.
“I can’t say enough about our defense — a total team effort,” Carson said.
Fueled by blitzes that disrupted Lake Stevens’ normally high-powered spread offense, M-P never let Vikings quarterback Nick Baker get comfortable. Baker entered the game with 1,585 yards passing and 18 TDs. Friday he was 20-for-33 for 182 yards and two interceptions.
Meanwhile, M-P generated two clock-eating scoring possessions in the second half that greatly reduced Lake Stevens’ chance to get back in the game.
“Our offense is also part of our defense. (The offense) had a couple of great ball-control drives that really helped us out,” Carson said.
In this duel between teams with completely different styles, M-P owned the first two quarters with its grind-it-out approach. The Tomahawks led 14-0 by the intermission.
M-P’s Ryan Sterley had a 32-yard TD run in the first quarter, and the Tomahawks converted an 11-yard scoring pass from quarterback Devin Peterson to sophomore tight end Jarrett Finau in the second quarter. Finau’s catch came with 52 seconds to go in the half and was Peterson’s only completion. He was 1-for-3.
Sterley, who finished with 49 rushing yards on six carries, set up his scoring run with an interception in M-P’s half of the field.
“That was great,” Carson said. “They stopped us on the first drive. Then we got after them and got that interception, go down and score.”
Lake Stevens was down 14 points by halftime despite intercepting a pass and recovering two fumbles. Bo Dickinson was the Vikings’ top offensive player in the first two quarters.
Dickinson’s participation was a surprise, based on Lake Stevens coach Tom Tri’s assessment earlier this week. Dickinson, who was out with a back injury, was doubtful for the game, Tri said Wednesday. But Dickinson, a senior co-captain, started and made an impact (68 yards rushing, 28 yards receiving) before leaving with a left ankle injury early in the third quarter.
M-P made it 21-0 with 6:22 to go in third quarter when Denton capped a nine-play drive with a 4-yard TD run. He carried seven times for 49 yards on the possession.
Caleb Posey essentially sealed it with a 9-yard scoring burst in the fourth quarter.
“This is probably the biggest game of the season. We just came out and our line blocked pretty good and did a good job, and our defense shut them down,” said Denton, who has rushed for 1,073 yards and 19 TDs this season.
M-P is big and physical and wore down Lake Stevens, particularly in the second half, Lake Stevens coach Tom Tri said.
“It’s kind of a bummer to lay an egg on your homecoming night against a team that I really thought we had a shot to beat. But not the way we played tonight,” Tri said.
The crowd was huge. Fans crammed both the home and visitor stands and the overflow of rooters stretched the entire distance of the field along the fence that borders the edge of the track.
At Lake Stevens H.S.
M-P7777—28
L. Stevens0000—0
Marysville-Pilchuck — Sterley 32 run (Stokes kick)
Marysville-Pilchuck — Finau 11 pass from Peterson (Stokes kick)
Marysville-Pilchuck — Denton 4 run (Stokes kick)
Marysville-Pilchuck — Posey 9 run (Stokes kick)
Records — Marysville-Pilchuck 4-0 in division, 6-0 overall. Lake Stevens 2-1, 4-2.
Writer Mike Cane: mcane@heraldnet.com. Check out the prep sports blog Double Team at www.heraldnet.com/doubleteam.
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