Ryan Murken

Your Prep Sports

WEST BRANCH – West Branch is no stranger to state semifinal appearances although it had been a little while since the Bears headed north to the UNI-Dome.

The 10^th semifinal appearance for West Branch will go down as one of the most memorable.

And among the most improbable.

Top-ranked West Branch overcame an 11-point fourth-quarter deficit with 14 unanswered points over the final six and half minutes on Friday in a wild 27-24 win over eighth-ranked MFL-Mar Mac in a Class 1A quarterfinal at a muddy and rain-soaked Butch Pedersen Field at the Little Rose Bowl.

“I’m not going to lie I was a little bit doubtful for a while too but you saw the determination of our kids and you knew they were going to get it done at a certain point,” West Branch acting head coach John Hierseman said. “They knew they had it.”

Senior quarterback Tye Hughes scored on touchdown runs of 11 and 33 yards in a span of a little more than two minutes and junior linebacker Reese Trepanier recovered a pair of fumbles in the final three minutes as West Branch returned to the Class 1A semifinals for the first time since 2011.

“It’s just all courage,” Hughes said. “We are a team that doesn’t give up, we fight to the very end. That’s what our coaches are on us to do all the time is never give up and play our hardest all the way to the end.”

West Branch (11-0) will face second-ranked Van Meter (10-1) in a Class 1A semifinal at the UNI-Dome in Cedar Falls on Friday at 10 a.m.

Van Meter defeated Sigourney/Keota 45 in a quarterfinal on Friday.

“It means a lot to go there in so many different ways,” Hierseman said. “These seniors have worked so hard for four years. It just means so much to get up there. I can’t wait.”

Bluntly speaking, things didn’t look good for West Branch late on Friday.

MFL Mar Mac (9-2) took a 24-13 lead when sophomore quarterback Zach Driscoll connected with Karter Decker for an 82-yard touchdown pass less with 10:55 left in the third quarter.

The next two West Branch possessions ended with punts.

MF Mar Mac had the ball and an 11-point lead with under 10 minutes to play on a muddy field caused by a driving rain that fell for the duration of the game.

West Branch didn’t have its leading tackler and rusher Andy Henson who rushed for 77 yards and a first-quarter touchdown but didn’t play the second half due to an injury.

The Bears never flinched.

“We told each other we were going to fight to the death,” West Branch junior lineman Logan Wright said. “We are going to give it our all and whatever happens, happens. Everyone picked each other up.”

The West Branch defense got a stop and after a 9-yard Bulldog punt the Bears marched 49-yards in seven plays and cut the lead to 24-19 on an 11-yard touchdown run by Hughes.

“The line just opened up a hole,” Hughes said. “I think that gave us the momentum.”

Two false start penalties backed MFL Mar Mac up to its own 10 yard line on its ensuing drive and facing fourth-and-17 the Bulldogs ran out of the back of the end zone for a safety.

Trailing 24-21 West Branch took over at the Bulldog 40 following the free kick and needed just two plays to take its first lead since the opening quarter.

“At halftime we regrouped, we went out there and killed it,” Trepanier said. “Andy was out, we had to pick him up because he’s the best player we got, we picked up the slack and everyone made plays.”

On the second play of the drive Hughes kept the ball on an option play and raced 33 yards untouched for a touchdown.

With 4:25 left West Branch led 27-24.

“Our receivers had some good blocks on the outside and it was wide open,” Hughes said. “I couldn’t believe it.”

The West Branch defense took care of the rest.

Trepanier recovered a fumble at the Bulldog 40 yard line on a third-and-three play with 2:38 left.

The wet football rolled out of the grasp of several MFL Mar Mac players before Trepanier hopped on it.

“I saw it pop out and I rolled over it and had it between my legs,” Trepanier said. “I turned around as fast as I could to grab it.”

MFL Mar Mac had one final chance taking over at its own 20 with 1:22 left but on the first play Driscoll was hit as he attempted to throw and Trepanier covered up the loose ball.

West Branch rushed for 186 yards in the second half despite the absence of Henson who entered with more than 1,300 rushing yards.

Hughes had 98 of his 121 rushing yards after halftime.

“Late in the fourth quarter we picked it up,” Wright said. “I feel like some people were thinking we weren’t going to win but we picked them up and held on from there.”

Junior Cale Seydel had 88 yards on 13 second-half carries including a 50-yard touchdown in relief of Henson.

“It looked bleak for a while but they just kept plugging away,” Hierseman said. “With the weather I felt like we only had a handful of bullets in the holster with what we could do but it was working. Our guys kept working.”

The win came with long-time head coach Butch Pedersen watching from the press box.

Pedersen is battling myelodyplastic syndrome, a blood cancer and began chemotherapy last week which limited him to the press box for Friday night’s thriller.

“He’s fighting his battle right now, we are fighting the battle but we are all fighting together,” Hughes said. “We are fighting for him. The courage he has just reflects on us.”

                                      WB                 MFL

First Downs               12                    11

Rushes-yards             39-278             152

Comp-Att-Int            3-7-0               1-7-0

Passing yards            14                    82

Total yards                292                  234

Punts-Avg.                 3-20.3              4-31.5

Fumbles-lost              2-1                   5-2

Penalties-yards         4-35                 7-40

West Branch           6  0  7  14    –  27

MFL Mar-Mac         8  8  8   0   –  24

WB – Andy Henson 37 run (Pat blocked)

MFL – Carver Blietz-Bentien 1 run (Karter Decker run)

MFL – Safety Punt blocked out of end zone

WB – Cale Seydel 50 run (Wyatt Fiderlein kick)

MFL – Karter Decker 82 pass from Zach Driscoll (Decker run)

WB – Tye Hughes 11 run (Run failed)

WB – Safety

WB – Tye Hughes 33 run (Kick failed)

Individual statistics

RUSHING – WB: Tye Hughes 14-121, Cale Seydel 13-88, Andy Henson 10-77, Kinnick Boelk 2-(-8). MFL: Wyatt Powell 14-120, Carver Blietz-Bentien 16-56, Karter Decker 4-14, Zach Driscoll 6-(-20), Quinn McGeough 4-7, Bryce Radloff 2-(-1), Team 3-(-24).

PASSING – WB: Tye Hughes 3-7-0 14. MFL: Zach Driscoll 1-7-0 82, Carver Blietz-Bentien 0-1-0 0.

RECEIVING – WB: Kinnick Boelk 2-12, Holden Arnaman 1-2. MFL: Karter Decker 1-82.

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