Polson defense stifles Bulldogs

The Daily Inter Lake

POLSON - The Polson High School football team will be playing at home next Saturday in the playoffs.

The Pirates' defense dominated Friday night, and the offense did just enough, against Whitefish for a 20-7 Northwestern A victory in the regular-season finale.

Senior running back Ted Morigeau scored a touchdown from 9 yards out with 9.4 seconds left in the game to ice it. But it was his two field goals prior to the fourth quarter along with his backfield mate and classmate Bryce Picard's 115 rushing yards on 34 carries that had Polson in control.

Oh, and a defense that held Whitefish to 98 total yards.

With the victory, Polson finished the regular season with a 5-1 conference record and 7-1 overall record. The Pirates earned the conference's No. 2 seed into the playoffs and will host Southwestern A's No. 3 seed, Anaconda. The Copperheads lost to Frenchtown on Friday night in Frenchtown to lose their conference's No. 2 seed.

Whitefish will take Northwestern A's No. 3 seed, with a 4-2 conference record and 6-2 overall record, to Frenchtown next Saturday in the opening round of the playoffs.

The Bulldogs grabbed a 7-6 lead with 11 mintues, 11 seconds left in the game when senior quarterback Zach Fennelly converted a QB sneak to cap a 45-yard drive.

But that scoring drive amounted to nearly half of their total yards.

"They completed dominated us," Whitefish coach Patrick Dryden said. "We didn't deserve to win."

Fennelly almost became the player of the game three plays after his go-ahead touchdown when he returned an interception 42 yards for a touchdown. But it was called back because of defensive holding.

The trailing 7-6 with with 7:22 left in the game, the Pirates caught a huge break.

Punting from their own 25-yard line, the Bulldogs' long snapper had a bad snap. Punter Byron Whitcomb managed to gain control and ran to his left to try and avoid the rush, but his punt was blocked out of bounds by freshman Brock Picard at the Bulldogs' 12-yard line.

"I was on the opposite side that he rolled and I was getting ready to hit him and then somebody else came up behind me and helped me tip the ball," Picard said.

Two plays later, Brock's older brother Bryce scored from 1 yard and Pat Dellwo caught Craig Bagnell's 2-point conversion all alone in the flat to put the Pirates ahead for good, 14-7.

Besides holding the Bulldogs to less than 100 yards of total offense, the Pirates held the Bulldogs to only five first downs. The Pirates completely shut down the conference's No. 1 running back in Luke Fennelly, who came into the game averaging 135 rushing yards and 1.7 touchdowns per game. Fennelly had just 46 yards on 13 carries.

"We have one of the better defenses in the state," said Bryce Picard, an inside linebacker. "We stuffed this great team. They've got a great offense and we stuffed them. We knew he was a great runner, a shifty runner. I don't even know what we did to stop him. We just came out and played the defense we play every week and it worked."

That defense that constantly changes between a five-man front and 3-4 look with pressure coming from the inside and outside on any given play dominated to the point that Polson ran 73 plays to Whitefish's 39.

"We really gang tackled," Polson coach Scott Wilson said. "We kept both the quarterback and tailback inside the tackles. We played to our philosophy and once again the kids ran it perfectly."

Even though the Pirates won the yardage battle by a good margin, 223-98, penalties killed nearly every drive. They had nine penalties totaling 63 yards.

"I was frustrated because every time we got it down inside the 25, we'd get a penalty," Wilson said. "We had six penalties in the first half and then another one in the first drive of the second half. But they offense made the plays when they needed to."

All things considering, both defenses played well.

"There were two plays of the game: The bad snap and then the turn of events after the interception for a touchdown," Wilson said.

… And both went Polson's way.

Whitefish 0 0 0 7 - 7

Polson 0 3 3 14 - 20

Second Quarter

P - Ted Morigeau 25 FG, 6:33. (Drive: 9 plays, 63 yards; key plays: Bryce Picard 12 run on 2nd-and-15 to Wf. 30, Morigeau 18 pass from Craig Bagnell to Wf. 9.)

Third Quarter

P - Morigeau 36 FG, 7:06. (Drive: 11 plays, 64 yards; key plays: Morigeau 25 run to Wf. 29, Conlin Benson 11 pass from Bagnell on 4th-and-4 to Wf. 12.)

Fourth Quarter

W - Zach Fennelly 1 run (Brad Nielsen kick), 11:11. (Drive: 9 plays, 45 yards; key plays: Fennelly 3 run on 3rd-and-1 to Pol. 24, Scott Yogodzinski 17 pass from Fennelly to Pol. 2.)

P - Bryce Picard 1 run (Pat Dellwo pass from Craig Bagnell), 6:35. (Drive: 3 plays, 12 yards; key plays: Brock Picard blocked punt at Wf. 12.)

P - Morigeau 9 run (kick failed), :09.4. (Drive: 10 plays, 54 yards; key plays: Picard 10 run on 3rd-and-6 to Wf. 40, Benson 21 pass from Bagnell on 3rd-and-8 to Wf. 17, scoring play on 4th-and-2.)

Wf. Pol.

First Downs 5 16

Rushes Yards 25-43 50-153

Passing Yards 55 70

Total Yards 98 223

Comp-Att-Int 6-14-0 7-23-0

Kickoff Ret. 4-64 2-39

Punt Ret. 0-0 0-0

Int. Ret. 0-0 0-0

Punts-Avg. 4-32.0 2-39.0

Sacked-Yards Lost 3-16 1-14

Fumbles-Lost 2-1 1-0

Penalties-Yards 5-50 9-63

INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS

RUSHING - Wf, Luke Fennelly 13-46, Matt Starr 2-6, Byron Whitcomb 1-1, Zach Fennelly 9-(-10). Pol, Bryce Picard 34-115, Ted Morigeau 13-60, Cody Doyle 1-(-2), Craig Bagnell 2-(-20).

PASSING - Wf, Z. Fennelly 6-14-0-55. Pol, Bagnell 7-23-0-70.

RECEIVING - Wf, Danny Neff 2-12, Scott Yogodzinski 1-17, Whitcomb 1-10, L. Fennelly 1-9, Kenny Overcast 1-7. Pol, Conlin Benson 4-56, Doyle 1-8, John Rausch 1-5, Morigeau 1-1.

Missed Field Goals - none.