LC pulls away for win
It’s not likely the Lake City High football team will win 17 straight to match the streak that was snapped last week.
The Timberwolves, coming off their first loss since 2005, had a nice answer Friday, though.
Lake City patiently fended off all that Post Falls could throw at it, as the T-Wolves pulled away late, 42-20, in a 5A Inland Empire League game at LC.
It may have been the Trojans’ third straight loss, but they’ll no doubt look back on this game as one of their better efforts through the first seven weeks.
The defending state champion T-Wolves (6-1, 2-0) all but locked up one of the IEL’s two state playoff berths. After a non-league game at home next week against Moses Lake, LC will conclude the regular season at Lewiston, which was clobbered 42-28 at Coeur d’Alene on Friday.
It seemed to take the T-Wolves a half to put last week behind them.
“Early we were kind of back in last week’s mode,” LC coach Van Troxel said, alluding to LC’s mistake-filled 27-26 loss to Central Valley. “We made some mistakes to get it started and they took advantage of it.”
Post Falls caught LC asleep when wide receiver Levi Buckles took a lateral and threw a 40-yard touchdown pass to Randy Hamilton that gave the Trojans (4-3, 0-1) a 7-0 lead.
It took LC until the middle of the second quarter to match the score. Quarterback Tommy Anderson found receiver Kyle Graves on a deep post for a 50-yard scoring play that evened things at 7-7 with 8:51 remaining before halftime.
The Trojans came right back as they needed just four plays to go 74 yards. Hamilton, who scooted 66 yards on a fake reverse to the 6-yard line, went the final 6 yards to give PF a 14-7 lead at the 5:46 mark.
A few minutes later, PF punted and seemed to pin LC deep at the 8. But the T-Wolves, after losing 4 yards on the first play, put together a 13-play series that culminated when quarterback Zach Clanton threw a 30-yard TD pass to Graves, who slipped out of a tackle at the 5 to finish the play. The point-after try pulled LC even at 14 with 32 seconds left before halftime.
On its second possession of the second half, LC had a short field at PF’s 45. On the eighth play, Jared Heston rambled 5 yards to give the T-Wolves their first lead at 21-14 with 5:11 to go in the third period.
PF answered again. With Nikk Reinhardt at quarterback, the Trojans drove 80 yards – mixing the pass with runs by Randy Hamilton before the junior QB found Cole Amende on a 15-yard TD connection. Amende made a nice one-handed stab.
But Reinhardt’s PAT was low and to the left, and PF trailed 21-20 with 1:35 to go in the third quarter.
In the fourth quarter, an interception by safety Christian Hanna set up another LC score, and the T-Wolves used a hefty dose of running back B.J. Palmer, who darted 8 yards on a counter to put LC ahead 28-20 with 7:55 remaining.
“We started off slow and we thought once again that we were going to beat Post Falls like we normally do,” said Palmer, who finished with 181 yards on 27 carries. “That’s what we’ve got to start realizing, that not every team is going to go ‘Wow, we’re playing Lake City.’ We don’t really get that at first. As soon as we realize that these guys can hang with us, we start playing the ball that we need to play. Post Falls is a great team.”
After the teams exchanged turnovers, LC took over on downs at the Trojans’ 41. The T-Wolves ran six times, taking nearly 3 minutes off the clock, before Palmer scored from 2 yards out over right guard to extend the lead to 35-20.
On PF’s first play, Heston intercepted Reinhardt and returned it 40 yards for a TD that made the final score more lopsided than how the game actually played out.
“Post Falls never quit,” Troxel said. “They came and they played hard. We told our guys there are no easy ones. Post Falls is a very good football team. They had a couple bad breaks at the end …. They’re as good as anybody we’ve played.”
PF coach Jeff Hinz praised his team.
“They fought from start to finish,” Hinz said. “They focused (and) they played their tails off. Lake City’s a very good ballteam.”