Valley Falls made plays early and often to all but put the game away Sept. 19 with county rival Jefferson County North and senior Josh Kearney took care of the rest in a 42-6 Dragons home victory.
When the dust settled on the rout, Kearney had more than 300 all-purpose yards thanks to 142 rushing yards and two 82-yard kickoff returns for touchdowns. He added three rushing scores to finish with 5 TDs on the night.
JCN’s first possession saw junior quarterback Austin Gaspard throw an interception on third-and-9 with Kearney making the play but fumbling the ball back to North while trying to return it for a score. A North player fell on the ball at the Chargers 12. On the next play, the Chargers fumbled the ball back to Valley Falls, however, and the Dragons were set up at the Charger 14.
Three plays later, Dragons junior running back Chance Gier took the ball in from 1 yard out to make it 6-0 Valley Falls with 9:36 left in the opening quarter. Valley Falls forced North to go three-and-out on their next possession and junior Riley Bunde blocked the ensuing punt and recovered it at the JCN 4. Kearney took the ball into the end zone on the next play and Gier added a 2-point conversion run to make it 14-0 Valley Falls.
Another Charger three-and-out gave the Dragons their next possession at the JCN 44 and, two plays later, Kearney broke free for a 39-yard TD run with junior quarterback Mitchell Streeter booting the extra-point kick to make it 21-0 Valley Falls.
From there the teams went into neutral offensively as they traded punts. JCN got the ball back with 8:32 left in the first half and the Chargers mounted their first extended drive of the game. A key play came on third-and-18 at the Dragons 46 when Gaspard threw a long pass to senior Matt Perry, who made a diving fingertip catch to give the Chargers a first down at the Valley Falls 13. The Dragons held the Chargers to a fourth-down play at the 10 and Gaspard found senior tight end Matt Noll in the end zone for the score to cut the Dragons’ lead to 21-6 with 3:16 left in the half.
The momentum was about as short-lived as possible, however, as Kearney fielded the ensuing kickoff at the Dragons 18 and weaved through the Chargers kickoff squad for an 82-yard touchdown return to make it 27-6 Valley Falls.
The Chargers’ next drive stalled just across midfield and, after a JCN punt, Kearney took a second-down handoff and rambled 85 yards for a touchdown to make it 35-6 Dragons with a 2-point conversion run by senior Garrett Jennings.
That was the score entering halftime and Kearney put the game further in the bag when he ran the opening kick in the second half back 82 yards again for a touchdown with Streeter’s extra-point kick making it 42-6. With the deficit at 36, the coaches put the running clock into effect and Valley Falls wouldn’t have an offensive play in the third quarter.
That was mainly because JCN drove from its own 18 to the Dragons 23 on 13 plays that ran the rest of the clock out in the period. A bad snap over Gaspard’s head in shotgun formation on second down gave the Chargers third-and-30 at the Dragons 43 and the remaining two downs only resulted in the Dragons taking over possesion at their own 32. The Dragons chewed up clock with eight rushing plays and turned the ball over on downs at the JCN 31 with 4:03 left in the game. North made it to the Valley Falls 28 before time expired on the 42-6 Dragons win.
The bulk of the offensive threat for Valley Falls other than Kearney was 11 rushes for 28 yards by Gier.
North was led by 33 rushing yards from both senior Riley Noll and junior Breck McMillan on 6 carries each. Junior Lance Leakey added 23 yards rushing on 16 carries. Gaspard finished the game 10-for-20 passing for 99 yards with a touchdown and interception. Perry had 4 catches for 46 yards in the game.
Dragons coach Rod Bunde said despite the relatively easy win he still saw some things his team needs to work on. The Dragons moved to 2-1 while JCN fell to 0-3.
“There are a lot of little things we need to work on. We had some stupid penalties,” Bunde said. The Dragons had 6 penalties for a total of 45 yards in the game. “Any of our backs have big scoring potential. Tonight, when Josh touched the ball, he made some things happen. I think the thing is we finally have some experienced upperclassmen and the boys fought hard tonight.”
