Douglas Miles

Your Prep Sports

TIFFIN – According to Clear Creek Amana senior quarterback Ryan Navara, the Clippers “have some dudes on our team at wide receiver.”

Navara emphatically proved his point with an aerial assault against Benton Community.

“We believe in all of them,” Navara said after throwing for 216 yards and touchdowns to three different receivers as Clear Creek Amana routed Benton, 49-3, in a Class 3A District 6 prep football game Friday night at Clipper Field. “That we can take a shot and we can hit it at any time.”

Clear Creek Amana (2-2, 1-1 District 6) got off to a rousing start when junior Gage Freeman fielded the opening kickoff of the game and raced 85 yards for a touchdown. Just 11 seconds into the contest, the Clippers were up, 7-0.

“It was as enthusiastic as can be after that,” fourth-year Clear Creek Amana Coach Gabe Bakker said. “We have talked in these first three weeks, ‘It is time for our special teams to make a big play.’ We hadn’t had one yet, so to get it on the opening kickoff, it really set the tone for the whole game.”

Navara made sure the early boost never faded with touchdown passes of 20 yards to senior receiver Tom Johnson, 38 yards to senior Brock Reade and 69 yards to junior Harrison Rosenberg.

“That is huge when special teams make plays, too,” Navara said. “It really helps us to go back out on defense and make a stop and the offense to go and hit a big play.”

With two rushing scores, Navara finished the game with five total touchdowns.

Junior Ben Swails got in on the fun when he replaced Navara for one possession in the second quarter. The result? A 37-yard TD strike of his own to Reade that helped the Clippers to a 42-3 halftime lead.

“I got a chance to go in last week and prove myself,” said Swails, who replaced an injured Navara under center in a Sep. 11 loss at 3A No. 2 Cedar Rapids Xavier. “We switched quarterbacks to just give me a shot and I came in and threw one.”

Swails was also instrumental on the defensive side of the ball.

The 6-foot-2 defensive back intercepted two passes, including an end zone snag that turned away a Benton scoring threat with 3:54 left in the third quarter.

Swails leads the Clippers with four thefts this season.

“I believe that my athletic ability is unusual,” Swails said. “I can use my height and my length to my advantage. I believe I can take any deep ball they throw me.”

The CCA defense appeared determined to keep Benton out of the end zone for the full 48 minutes.

Senior D-Lineman Wes Quinlan punctuated his team’s first half dominance with an interception, while Reade forced a fourth turnover via a second end zone interception with 3:00 left in the game.

Even after a long Benton kickoff return in the second quarter gave the Bobcats the ball at the CCA 13-yard line, the Clippers’ defense bowed up and yielded just three points.

“Very proud,” Bakker said. “We adjusted our defense. That is kudos to our defensive staff. The kids bought in and they made plays.”

Treyton Bickel blocked a punt in the first quarter for the Clippers.

Benton (2-2, 1-1) was limited to just 157 total yards, 113 of which were produced by a whopping 31 rush attempts from junior tailback Lawrence Wallace.

Senior tailback Alex Figueroa led the Clippers with 80 yards on the ground, while Reade (75 yards), Rosenberg (69) and Johnson (68) each posted big receiving yardage totals.

Benton will play Grinnell next week at Vinton-Shellsburg High School.

The Bobcats have been forced to play all of their games this season away from its home stadium in Van Horne after it sustained significant damage in the Aug. 10 derecho storm.

Clear Creek Amana will travel to Newton next week before closing the seven-game regular season with home tilts against Oskaloosa and Grinnell.

“We have to be happy with what we did, but we can’t be content because of the mistakes that we made,” Bakker said. “They are still learning to be involved. If we can learn from that and improve, we are going to be just fine.”

                                    BC                  CCA

First Downs                13                      9

Rushes-yards              43-136             23-101

Comp-Att-Int              3-13-4             11-14-0

Passing yards              21                    259

Total yards                  157                  360

Punts-avg.                   4-28.3              2-33.0

Fumbles-lost               1-0                   0-0

Penalties-yards           2-25                 1-5

Benton Community    0   3   0  0  –   3

Clear Creek Amana 14  28  7  0  –  49

CCA – Gage Freeman 85 kickoff return (Anthony Hennes kick)

CCA – Tom Johnson 20 pass from Ryan Navara (Hennes kick)

CCA – Brock Reade 38 pass from Navara (Hennes kick)

CCA – Reade 37 pass from Ben Swails (Hennes kick)

BC – Nathan Rottman 31 Field goal

CCA – Harrison Rosenberg 69 pass from Navara (Hennes kick)

CCA – Navara 1 run (Hennes kick)

CCA – Navara 20 run (Hennes kick)

Individual Statistics

RUSHING – Benton Community: Colin Buch 5-(-11), Aidan Thompson 3-5, Jacob Brecht 2-18, Lawrence Wallace 31-113, Aidan Gallery 2-11. Clear Creek Amana: Alex Figueroa 11-80, Ryan Navara 3-(-8), Gage Freeman 5-23, Ben Swails 1-14, Harrison Rosenberg 1-(-1), Xavier Williams 1-(-1), Jackson Schmidt 1-(-6).

PASSING – Benton Community: Colin Buch 3-12-3-21, Aidan Thompson 0-1-1-0, Aidan Gallery 0-0-0-0. Clear Creek Amana: Ryan Navara 9-12-0-216, Ben Swails 1-1-0-37, Jackson Schmidt 1-1-0-6.

RECEIVING – Benton Community: Sam Wallace 1-10, Jacob Brecht 1-4, Tyler Atkinson 1-7.  Clear Creek Amana: Harrison Rosenberg 1-69, Tom Johnson 4-68, Brock Reade 2-75, Reece Hoffman 1-6, Gage Freeman 1-23, Alex Figueroa 1-13, Ben Swails 1-5.

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