No. 2 West High Downs No. 6 Cedar Rapids Prairie in Top-10 District Showdown
Pat Harty
Your Prep Sports
IOWA CITY – There is no such thing as a bad victory, especially when it comes against a ranked opponent on homecoming.
But as the second-ranked West High football team showed on Friday, there is some truth to recording a weird victory.
From the unseasonably warm weather to the 8:18 p.m. starting time to West High quarterback Evan Flitz being intercepted twice by the same defensive lineman, there were plenty of weird things that occurred on Friday.
But the Trojans overcame it all to defeat sixth-ranked Cedar Rapids Prairie 48-28 in a key Class 4A district matchup.
“It was a weird game,” said West High coach Garret Hartwig. “It’s weird weather here in September. It’s just an odd feel, I guess, and strange things happen.
“I always feel with us and Prairie it’s never going to be a 7:15 kickoff and it’s never going to be normal for whatever reason. They make you play at their pace very well and they certainly did that tonight. I give them a lot of credit. They don’t quit. They’re tough kids.”
West High was its own worst enemy on Friday as it committed nine penalties to go along with Flitz being intercepted twice by Prairie defensive lineman Gavin Ozmun on short passes near the line of scrimmage.
One of West High’s penalties erased a 65-yard touchdown run by Andre White in the fourth quarter in which he broke several tackles and made several defenders miss in space.
“You can never be disappointed with a win,” Hartwig said. “But as I told the boys in there, I wanted to step back out on the field tonight and coach again and get things corrected. I’m really happy with our effort. We never quit. But we continue to make mistakes that you can’t do as you get to the end of September and into October.
“We’re going to go to work again next week. We’re at the halfway point and we’ve still got room to improve.”
West High improved to 5-0 with the victory, while Prairie fell to 4-1 overall.
Flitz made up for his two interceptions by completing 20-of-27 passes for 238 yards and four touchdowns, including two to speedy senior receiver Traevis Buchanan.
Flitz also rushed for 104 yards, with 34 of them coming on a touchdown run that expanded West High’s lead to 35-20 with 10 minutes, 35 seconds left in the third quarter.
He also scored the game’s final touchdown on a 14-yard run with 4:37 left in the fourth quarter.
“The craziest thing is we made a lot of mistakes tonight,” Flitz said. “We have a lot to work on and improve on going into this district gauntlet and going into the playoffs.
“The good news about a game like this is we have stuff to improve on.”
Flitz made no excuses for his two interceptions. His first interception, which Ozmun returned seven yards for a touchdown, came with 7:38 left in the second quarter.
Jayce Smith converted the point-after kick to even the score at 14-14.
“They were just bad plays on my part,” Flitz said. “I need to get in and fix some things.”
West High scored on its next offensive possession as Flitz connected with Buchanan for a 17-yard touchdown pass with 6:59 left in the second quarter.
The Trojan defense then forced Prairie to punt and West High only needed two plays to score its next touchdown, which came on a 68-run by backup running back Trumell Roberts with 2:10 left before halftime.
Prairie was forced to punt again late in the second quarter and West High took possession at the Prairie 37-yard line with 1:47 left in the second quarter.
But then Ozmun struck again, intercepting Flitz’s pass with enough time still left on the clock to do some damage.
And that’s what happened as Braxton Zimmerman caught a 10-yard touchdown pass with 33 seconds left in the second quarter to cut the lead to 28-20 at halftime.
West scored three more touchdowns in the second half, while holding the Hawks to just one touchdown, which came on an 8-yard run by backup quarterback Izaak Lindgren with 10:34 left in the fourth quarter.
The fact that West High scored 48 points despite making numerous mistakes should send a message to future opponents.
“It says that we have a lot of playmakers and our offensive line does a fabulous job for us,” Flitz said. “Those guys are able to keep us in games even when sometimes we get off to slow starts or make mistakes because they’re doing their job every play and being so strong out there.”
West High finished with 284 rushing yards, 238 passing yards and 26 first downs.
Prairie finished with 203 rushing yards, with 153 coming from junior Keegan Simmons.
Prairie West
First downs 26 17
Rushes-yards 46-203 28-284
Passing yards 125 238
Fumbles-lost 2-2 1-1
Penalties-yards 5-57 9-66
ICW – Traevis Buchanon 4 pass from Evan Flitz (Lucas Karwal kick)
CRP – Keegan Simmons 49 run (Jayce Smith kick)
ICW – Austin West 23 pass from Flitz (Karwal kick)
CRP – Gavin Ozmun 7 interception return (Smith kick)
ICW – Buchanan 17 pass from Flitz (Karwal kick)
ICW – Trumell Robert 68 run (Karwal kick)
CRP – Braxton Zimmerman 10 pass from Dalton Rayner (kick failed)
ICW – Flitz 34 run (Karwal kick)
ICW – Robert 20 pass from Flitz (kick failed)
CRP – Izaak Lindgren 8 run (Lindgren pass to Keegan Simmons)
ICW – Flitz 14 run (Karwal kick)
Individual statistics
RUSHING – CRP: Keegan Simmons 28-153, Braxton Zimmerman 7-23, Izaak Lindgren 2-16, Dalton Rayner 8-12. ICW: Evan Flitz 11-104, Andre White 7-85, Trumell Roberts 3-71, Peter Breitbach 4-20, Noah Aanestad 2-2, Dylan Miene 2-2.
PASSING – CRP: Dalton Rayner 11-22-1-116, Izaak Lindgren 1-1-9. ICW: Evan Flitz 20-27-238-2
RECEIVING – CRP: Jace Andregg 4-58, Keegan Simmons 2-9, Gavin Dooley 1-16, Grant Smith 1-11, Braxton Zimmerman 1-10, Tyler Graham 1-7, Caleb Fuller 1-5. ICW: Traevis Buchanan 7-72, Jalen Gaudet 5-81, Austin Geasland 3-39, Austin West 2-29, Dillon Doyle 2-9, Trumell Roberts 1-20.