Ryan Murken

Your Prep Sports

The challenges facing Lucas Stanton in his first season at Solon seemed to stand out fairly easily.

A first-year coach implementing an adjusted offensive scheme with almost entirely new personnel in a season with a limited offseason due to a global pandemic isn’t exactly a recipe for early season success.

Just as Stanton predicted it took some time to heat up but the Solon offense seems to be cooking at the right time.

Solon (2-2) put up more than 400 yards of total offense and scored 42 points for the second consecutive week on Friday in a 42-7 road win over South Tama (2-2).

“There is nothing super complicated about what we do offensively but we didn’t get the whole summer with them and we knew that we were going to be behind a little bit at the beginning of the season with our offense,” Stanton said. “We knew it was going to take some time to catch up and I feel like we are getting to that point.”

The offensive numbers have been impressive for the Spartans in back-to-back wins over Union and South Tama.

Solon averaged 275 yards of total offense and scored 32 total points in back-to-back losses to open the season, albeit to a pair of top-five ranked undefeated teams.

The Spartans have scored 42 points in consecutive wins the past two weeks while averaging 424 yards of offense.

“We told the kids that we’ve gotten better every week offensively at what we are trying to do,” Stanton said. “We are seeing the improvement that we want to see.”

The floodgates opened for the Spartan offense in a week-three win at Union in the form of a 405-yard rushing performance on a rainy night at Union.

In the win over South Tama on Friday the Spartans turned in their most balanced and productive offensive performance of the season rushing for 275 yards and three scores and throwing for 154 yards and three touchdowns.

Sophomore quarterback Blake Timmons completed 8-of-13 passes for 154 yards in the win and was one of three Solon players with more than 70 yards rushing.

“I do want to be more balanced than what we have been but there are things we need to work on to do that,” Stanton said. “We were able to do some things on Friday that we we’ve been wanting to do and looking to do. It wasn’t perfect by any means but we are getting to the point that we want to be.”

Timmons had touchdown passes of 19, 39 and 45 yards as Solon averaged a season-high 8.3 yards per play.

After averaging 4.9 yards per snap during its 0-2 start the Spartans are averaging 8.2 yards per play the past two weeks.

“We got some more of those explosive plays that we’ve been wanting to get,” Stanton said. “We had a lot more plays over 15 yards which was nice to see.”

The Week of the QB: Timmons had the best game of his career for Solon on Friday on a huge day for Your Prep Sports area quarterbacks.

All four area quarterbacks in action on Friday accounted for more than 200 yards of offense and two touchdowns.

Regina senior Ashton Cook went 19-of-26 passing for 228 yards and two touchdowns against Wapello. West Branch senior Gavin Hierseman was 16-of-22 for 254 yards and four scores in a win over Wilton.

Clear Creek Amana senior Ryana Navara had perhaps the best night of any area signal caller going 10-of-12 for 215 yards and three touchdowns and also ran for two scores in a 49-3 win over Benton.

Mr. Do-it-all: Clear Creek Amana junior Ben Swails has shown the knack for making big plays.

On Friday Swails made play after play in every phase of the game for the Clippers.

Check out this stat line for the 6-foot-2, 175-pound swais.

Two interceptions and a solo tackle on defense. One reception for 14 yards and a 37-yard touchdown pass on offense. Just for good measure Swails had a punt for 42 yards.

Opponent TBD: Teams across the state have been updating schedules on the fly all season as games are cancelled due to COVID-19. Regina added opponents late in the week in each of the first two weeks of the season.

West Branch enters that same situation this week with Northeast announcing last week it would have to cancel two games after entering quarantine.

West Branch (2-2) hopes to announce a week five opponent early this week.

Offensive performer of the week: In a week filled with strong quarterback play and several impressive area offensive performances no one was more productive than Clear Creek Amana senior quarterback Ryan Navara.

Navara threw for 215 yards and three touchdowns while tossing just two incompletions and rain for two more touchdowns in a 49-3 route of Benton Community.

Best of the rest: Solon senior receiver Colton Hoffman caught five passes for 121 yards and had touchdown grabs of 39 and 45 yards in a 42-7 win over South Tama.

West Branch sophomore receiver Carver Boelk caught three passes for 109 yards including touchdown grabs of 59 and 32 yards in a 43-8 win over Wilton.

Regina senior running back Theo Kolie rushed for 124 yards and four touchdowns on 21 carries and also caught two passes for 14 yards in a 43-16 win over Wapello.

Defensive performer of the week: Trying to snap a two-game losing skid West Branch needed a big game from its defense on Friday and the Bears got just that led by senior linebacker Kaleb Sexton.

Sexton had five solo stops and 2.5 sacks among his team-high seven tackles on Friday and also picked off a pass in a 43-8 road win over Wilton.

Best of the rest: Regina junior defensive lineman Josh Gaffey had 3.5 tackles, including three solo stops, and intercepted a pass in a 43-16 win over Wapello.

Clear Creek Amana senior defensive end TJ Bollers had 5.5 tackles, including four solo stops and half a sack in a 49-3 win over Benton Community.

Solon junior cornerback Jake Quillin had a pair of solo tackles and picked off a pass in a 42-7 road win at South Tama.

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