West Branch honors 1966 squad by crushing Jesup 47-0 in Throwback game
Susan Harman
Your Prep Sports
WEST BRANCH – West Branch honored its undefeated state championship team from the fall of 1966 in its annual Throwback game. The current Bears did the veterans proud with a 47-0 waltz over Jesup to open 1A District 3 play.
“It’s great to honor the people who played for West Branch in the past, and it was our job to go out and play West Branch football for them,” senior captain Ben Thompson said.
The Bears improved to 3-0, 1-0 while Jesup is 0-4, 0-1.
This is a game West Branch figured to win given the teams’ wildly differing success so far this season, but the Bears did so with style particularly to start and finish the game.
Quarterback Beau Cornwell threw the ball beautifully, and Thompson, a receiver, showed off his speed, hands and ballet-like feet along the sidelines. Tanner Lukavsky ran hard behind an offensive line (Jaden Hierseman, Dalyn Pedersen, Drake Bloem, Jacob Barnhart and Billy Friis) that manhandled the J-Hawks up front.
“They played great; we had an awesome push,” Thompson said of the line.
And the defense was tough, physical and aggressive all night, holding Jesup to 76 yards of offense and five first downs.
The Bears jumped to a 21-0 lead before the first quarter ended. They drove 72 yards on three plays in their first possession with Cornwell connecting with a streaking Thompson on a 48-yarder for the TD.
An interception by Lukavsky set the Bears up at the Jesup 12, and Lukavsky converted that into a TD two plays later.
An interception by Brett Schiele on the next Jesup possession gave the Bears the ball at the J-Hawk 40. A 15-yard screen pass to Lukavsky on fourth-and-10 gave the Bears a third TD.
The Bears looked smooth, efficient and dominant, but in the second quarter they hit a lull.
“We started making some mental mistakes,” Thompson said. “We’ll look at it tomorrow when we have film and stuff, and we’ll get it all fixed.”
“I thought we got a little lackadaisical in the second quarter,” Bears coach Butch Pedersen said. “That’s indicative of a young team when you get a lead, but we scored right before half and came back and dominated the second half.”
With 1:24 left in the half Cornwell directed a four-play, 72-yard touchdown drive in just 33 seconds. Thompson gathered possession of the 22-yard TD pass as he was falling backward. He got his toes down just inside the sideline in the end zone.
“I thought I was in and the ref did too, and that’s all that matters I guess,” Thompson said. “We wanted to get one more score. It would help us down the road if we practice a hurry-up offense in late-game situations, so we just wanted to put one more on the board.”
Meanwhile the Bear defense smothered the J-Hawk offense.
“One of the things we have on defense is flying to the ball,” linebacker Andrew Black said. “We stress that a lot at practice. I go into every game trying to put in my mind to get at least one sack. Today I had five or six tackles for loss. I’ll take that over a sack any day.”
Black had seven tackles, including five for losses, and he seemed to be in the backfield all game. He wasn’t alone; a swarm of Bears zeroed in on every Jesup ballcarrier.
“We had some nice hits out there,” Pedersen said, beaming.
The Bears had two interceptions, and Brady Lukavsky blocked a punt that set up the final touchdown.
Leading 28-0 at halftime, the Bears’ mission was simple. “Our mission was to come out and really shut the door,” Pedersen said. “That’s what we told them. We wanted smash-mouth football.”
They took the opening kickoff and drove 68 yards in seven plays capped by another Thompson TD catch, this one a 20-yarder in which he wrestled the ball away from the defender.
“We kind of rolled around,” Thompson said. “I was on top and then I ended up on the bottom. The ref felt I had the majority of the ball, so he called it a touchdown
Cornwell completed 13-of-18 passes for 206 yards and four TDs. Thompson tied a school record with three touchdown catches. Tanner Lukavsky rushed for 101 yards.
West Branch plays at Maquoketa Valley next Friday.
Jesup WB
First downs 5 17
Rushing-yards 33-69 28-132
Comp-att-int 2-11-2 13-18-0
Passing-yards 7 206
Punts-avg. 7-28.7 2-30.5
Fumbles-lost 3-1 2-0
Penalties-yards 5-40 2-10
Jesup 0 0 0 0 – 0
West Branch 21 7 12 7 – 47
WB – Ben Thompson 48 pass from Beau Cornwell (Javier Zamudio kick)
WB – Tanner Lukavsky 3 run (Zamudio kick)
WB – Lukavsky 15 pass from Cornwell (Zamudio kick)
WB – Thompson 22 pass from Cornwell (Zamudio kick)
WB – Thompson 20 pass from Cornwell (kick failed)
WB – Lukavsky 4 run (pass failed)
WB – Jacob Graves 6 run (Zamudio kick)
Individual Statistics
RUSHING – Jesup: Cole VanBrocklin 16-37, Tristen Reyes 12-23, Dylan Brown 3-2, Zach McNeese 2-10, team 1-(-13). West Branch: Tanner Lukavsky 17-101, Jacob Graves 5-20, Beau Cornwell 1-14, Levi Kleinmeyer 1-3, Morgan Hartz 1-0.
PASSING – Jesup: Van Brocklin 2-8-1-7, Brown 0-3-1-0. West Branch: Cornwell 13-18-0-206.
RECEIVING – Jesup: Josh McGill 1-6, Zach McNeese 1-1. West Branch: Ben Thompson 4-96, Brady Lukavsky 2-45, Jacob Graves 3-44, Tanner Lukavsky 2-24, Brett Schiele 2-(-3).