Ryan Murken

Your Prep Sports

DAVENPORT – City High did its best to battle its way out of the early deficit it found itself in against Davenport North on Thursday evening.

The Wildcats made sure the hole was simply too deep to escape.

Davenport North jumped to 14-0 lead and countered every City High comeback attempt in a 43-19 win over the Little Hawks in a Class 4A, District 4 tilt at Brady Street Stadium in Davenport.

“We kept battling but the battle is fought throughout the week and there are some areas where we have to get better at yet just understanding how important preparation is,” City High coach Dan Sabers said. “Out of all of our losses this is one where there are definitely some positive things that I think we can take out of it.”  

Jack West passed for 209 yards, all in the first half, and Davenport North (4-2) had 266 of its 329 rushing yards after halftime while racking up 538 yards of total offense.

Kade Schultz ran for 101 yards and Koby Dirks and West each rushed for 63 yards as the Wildcats improved to 1-1 in district play.

City High returned a pair of kickoff returns for touchdowns and got a career-high 199 yards passing from junior quarterback Raph Hamilton but couldn’t overcome an early deficit while dropping to 2-4 on the season and 1-1 in District 4 play.

“That was a game of the good, the bad and the ugly,” Davenport North coach Adam Hite said. “We looked really good at times and we looked really bad at times but our guys really responded. I never saw them get down and we kept fighting and fighting and that’s all I can ask them to do.”

Davenport North jumped to a 14-0 lead less than 16 minutes into the game.

The Wildcats started the scoring with a 41-yard touchdown strike from West to Trevor Collins on its first possession and went up 14-0 on a 1-yard scoring run by Kolby Dirks set up by a 32-yard pass from West to Priest Sheedy.

City High closed the gap to 14-6 on the ensuing possession when Gable Mitchell hauled in a 40-yard pass from Hamilton to set up a 3-yard Tonka Hickman touchdown run.

Davenport North threatened to pull away before halftime when Schultz capped a 7-play, 76-yard drive with a 2-yard touchdown run to make the score 22-6 but City High answered quickly.

Sophomore Jamari Newsom took the ensuing kickoff at the 20 yard line and raced down the sideline 80 yards for a touchdown that cut the lead to 22-12 at the half.

“We have to tackle better, we have a little work to do yet but we did make some plays tonight,” Sabers said. “We battled, sometimes when we’ve got behind we didn’t do so well this year and I think we made some progress there.”

City High appeared poised to seize the momentum early in the fourth quarter.

After forcing Davenport North to punt on its opening possession of the second half the Little Hawks orchestrated their best drive of the night.

City High put together a 16-play march from its own 18 to the Wildcat 4 yard line that took nearly nine minutes off the clock.

The Little Hawks had a first and goal from the Davenport North 4 but came up empty missing a 22 yard field goal with 11:52 left.

“We went 80 some yards and we were in it and we didn’t get it in when we needed to,” Sabers said. “Those are the types of things that we have to have to win ball games. That’s where we are at, we have to be nearly perfect to win games this point.”

Davenport North took over at its own 20 and went 80 yards in seven consecutive running plays, taking a 29-12 lead on a 7-yard touchdown run by Dirks.

“I tell our guys all the time we can be a dominant team when we play our game of football and tonight was it,” Hite said. “We ran inside zone up and down the field we didn’t do anything special that’s who we are and our guys believe in it and that’s awesome.”

City High still had a shot when Hickman returned the ensuing kickoff 77 yards for a score to cut the lead to 29-19 but Davenport North scored the final 14 points.

West stripped the ball from Hickman and returned it 42 yards for a touchdown with 7:51 left and the senior quarterback then scored on a 3-yard run less than three minutes later to make it 43-19.

West finished 13-of-18 passing for 209 yards and a touchdown and added 63 yards on the ground.

“He’s a returning starter so he knows what he’s doing,” Sabers said of West. “They played hard and they got after us and we kind of knew that would be the case.”

Hamilton went 11-of-26 for 199 yards with Jacob Means catching two passes for 78 yards and Mitchell hauling in four passes for 61 yards.

Hickman finished with 50 yards rushing on 16 carries.

City High returns to the Quad Cities next Friday to take on Pleasant Valley (1-4).

“We’ve got to come back next week,” Sabers said. “It’s a wide open district and I don’t think there is really a dominant team.

                                                ICH                 DN

First Downs                             12                    23

Rushes-yards                         27-88               49-329

Comp-Att-Int                         11-25-0            12-18-2

Passing yards                         199                  209

Total yards                               287                  538

Punts-avg.                              4-39.3              3-34.7

Fumbles-lost                           3-2                   0-0

Penalties-yards                      3-20                 12-120

City High                     0  12  0   7   –  19

Davenport North       7  15  0  21  –  43

DN – Trevor Collins 41 pass from Jack West (Isaac Griffiths kick)

DN – Koby Dirks 1 run (Griffiths kick)

ICH – Tonka Hickman 3 run (Kick blocked)

DN – Kade Schultz 6 run (Priest Sheedy pass from West)

ICH – Jamari Newsom 80 kick off return (Pass failed)

DN – Dirks 7 run (Griffiths kick)

ICH – Hickman 77 kick off return (Silas Lulinda kick)

DN – Jack West 42 fumble return (Griffiths kick)

DN – West 3 run (Griffiths kick)

Individual Statistics

RUSHING – ICH: Tonka Hickman 16-50, Raph Hamilton 10-41, Sila Lulinda 1-(3-). DN: Kade Schultz 19-101, Koby Dirks 9-63, Jack West 9-63, Tyson Hill 5-54, Damontinez Pierre 3-16, Cade Sheedy 2-37, Dominic Wisemen 1-6, Yovani Morales 1-(-4), Team 2-(-7). 

PASSING – ICH: Raph Hamilton 11-25-0 199. DN: Jack West 13-18-2 209.

RECEIVING – ICH: Gable Mitchell 4-61, Kolby Kucera 3-27, Jacob Means 2-78, Tonka Hickman 2-33. DN: Priest Sheedy 6-88, Trevor Collins 3-63, Quincy Wiseman 2-42, Yovani Morales 2-16.

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