Chris Caporale, sports@wolfrivermedia.com
Bonduel controlled the line of scrimmage on offense and defense as the Bears dominated Crivitz in a season-opening, hard-hitting high school football game, resulting in a 27-6 nonconference victory Thursday.
Preston Robaidek scored two rushing touchdowns in the second quarter and added a touchdown reception in the fourth quarter to lead the Bears.
Bonduel tallied 325 rushing yards, a result of wearing down the Wolverines’ defense through 54 rushing attempts.
Senior Blake Stoss racked up the most yardage, with 137 yards on the ground to go with a rushing touchdown in the fourth quarter. Bonduel held the ball for the majority of the fourth quarter, partially because of its ability to keep the chains moving. When the Bears needed a big play, they turned to their senior running backs to pick up the needed yardage.
“We traditionally pride ourselves on being able to do that. It was nice to see them come out and do that in the third and fourth quarter,” Bonduel head coach James Westrich said. “Crivitz hit hard, a very physical team. So for us to be able to control the ball like we did in the second half is really impressive.”
“We had a couple of guys go down with injury, so we had some young guys step in,” Crivitz head coach Matt Bernier said. “Guys were compensating for that. Our conditioning needs to get better. We got wore down there, and that’s the bottom line.”
Robaidek’s opening score was set up by a 44-yard run by Wyatt Erb to extend the drive. Robaidek scored on a 4-yard touchdown run just 57 seconds into the second quarter.
On the Wolverines’ next possession, Bonduel’s Eric Bergsbaken recovered a fumble on a failed option play to give the Bears the ball back.
Westrich approved of his team’s performance for the season opener, but knows his athletes have to continue improving, especially with young players all over the field.
“We are getting better. That’s our main goal right now,” Westrich said. “We’ve got a young team. Our focus is to get better.”
The Bears turned the ball over after going for it on fourth down and 5, missing the first down marker by 1 yard. Bonduel also fumbled on the opening possession of the second half. Both of the turnovers occurred on the Crivitz side of the field.
Robaidek had a 20-yard touchdown run on Bonduel’s final possession of the first half. Blake Stoss converted the two-point conversion on a run to the left side to extend the lead to 14-0.
Crivitz responded with a two-minute drill of its own, in large part to Ryan Padgett’s 44-yard catch to bring the Wolverines within the 10-yard line with one minute remaining in the half.
The Wolverines were out of time outs, so after two rushing attempts and a spike play, Sebastian Atwood was forced to go for it on fourth down. He recorded Crivitz’s only score a 6-yard touchdown run in what was the final play of the first half.
Robaidek found the end zone for the final score of the game on an 8-yard reception roughly halfway through the fourth quarter.
Robaidek ran for 48 yards and accounted for all 36 receiving yards for the Bears on three receptions.
Bonduel 27, Crivitz 6
Crivitz 0 6 0 0 6
Bonduel 0 14 0 13 27
First Quarter
No scoring
Second Quarter
B: Robaidek 4-yard run (PAT missed) 6-0 (0:57). Robaidek 20-yard run (conversion good on Stoss 2-yard run) 14-0 (9:12).
C: Atwood 6-yard run (conversion missed) 14-6 (12:00).
Third Quarter
No scoring.
Fourth Quarter
B: Stoss 3-yard run (PAT missed) 20-6 (9:51). Robaidek 8-yard catch from Pedersen (PAT good) 27-6 (5:47).