By Aaron Coe
Herald Writer
ARLINGTON — Enough, already.
After two losses to powerful teams, the Snohomish Panthers were not a happy bunch.
They took out their frustrations on another strong team Friday night in a 28-7 Western Conference North Division victory over the Arlington Eagles at Arlington High School.
It’s not that Snohomish (1-1 in the conference, 1-2 overall) played poorly in its first two games — an 18-17 seasoning-opening loss to perennial power South Kitsap and a 14-7 loss to Lake Stevens a week ago. They just didn’t play quite well enough against two teams that will likely be ranked in the Associated Press top 10 when the poll is released after the weekend.
Although Arlington is generally as formidable a foe as South Kitsap and Lake Stevens, Snohomish was just too good on both offense and defense Friday night.
"The difference was our line," said Snohomish quarterback John Knutsen, who completed four of 10 passes for 67 yards, rushed for 48 yards and ran the Panthers option to near perfection.
"Your team is nothing without a line, and it just took two games for our line to kick butt. We’ve got one of the best lines in Wesco is far as I’m concerned."
The Snohomish defense held a usually potent Eagles offense to 134 yards, and 61 of those came on a late fourth quarter pass from quarterback Kevin McCormack to Joseph Boitano. Arlington managed only 29 rushing yards.
"Our defense just swarmed the ball," Snohomish coach Mark Perry said. "They did an awesome job. They didn’t have very much besides that one pass."
The Panthers, who struggled in the early portions of the two losses, got things going late in the first quarter against the Eagles. Then they dominated the second quarter on their way to a 21-0 halftime lead.
While the defense harassed the Eagles, the offense defined Snohomish football — four ugly yards and clods of sod, save for one big play that started the Panthers’ downpour.
Knutsen used a beautiful play action pass to give the Panthers a 7-0 lead with 3:39 remaining in the first quarter. He turned right, faked a handoff to his running back, then spun left and fired a perfect strike to Tom Foisy in the end zone for a 33-yard TD.
"I turned around and I had great blocking from the line," Knutsen said. "He was wide open, so I gave him a nice floater and let him run under it."
After their brief flirtation with the passing game, Snohomish returned to its customary ground attack.
Knutsen made it 14-0 on a option keeper that went seven yards for a TD with 9:24 remaining in the first half. Panthers punter Derek Bennion kept the drive alive with a 5-yard run on a fake punt on a fourth-and-3 play from the Eagles’ 45.
Knutsen carried twice for 22 yards in Snohomish’s third scoring drive, capped by Ross Fay’s 5-yard TD blast up the middle for a 21-0 lead with 2:40 left in the half. Fay ran four times for 18 yards on the drive, which featured eight consecutive running plays totaling 49 yards.
Snohomish’s defense held the Arlington offense to just 49 yards in the first half.
The Panthers finally made a mistake in the third quarter.
Arlington’s punt rolled to a near stop at about the Snohomish 25, before a Panther inexplicably pounced on the ball, which squirted loose and was recovered by Arlington’s Joseph Boitano at the 18. Two plays later, Eagles receiver Michael Klein hauled in a 20-yard TD pass from Kevin McCormack to cut Snohomish’s lead to 21-7 with 50 seconds remaining in the third quarter.
"That was really our only mistake all night," Perry said. "I’ll have to watch the film to see what happened there."
Snohomish running back Jacob Darling sprinted 30 yards down his sideline for a TD and a 28-7 Panthers lead with 5:06 left.
McCormack completed seven of 21 passes for 105 yards.
Snohomish |
7 |
14 |
0 |
7 |
— |
28 |
Arlington |
0 |
0 |
7 |
0 |
— |
7 |
Snohomish—Foisy 33 pass from Knutsen (Bennion kick)
Snohomish—Knutsen 7 run (Bennion kick)
Snohomish—Fay 5 run (Bennion kick)
Arlington—Klein 20 pass from McCormack (Nielsen kick)
Snohomish—Darling 30 run (Bennion kick)
Records—Snohomish 1-1 in league, 1-2 overall. Arlington 2-1, 2-1.
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