Blue Hawks vanquish Blackhawks

It has been a season of high-scoring accomplishment for the Thompson Falls Blue Hawk football team.

Taking their first season as 8-Man entity by storm, coach Jared Koskela and his Hawks quickly established themselves as one of the best teams in western Montana early this season, and finished the regular campaign with a flourish last Friday night, taking down the visiting Seeley-Swan Blackhawks 55-0 on Previs Field to clinch the No. 2 seed from the west into the State 8-Man playoffs.

Earning a home game in the playoffs along with the second seed, the 8-1 Hawks will host 3-5 Twin Bridges, the No. 3 seed from the south, at 7 p.m. Friday, again at Previs Field. Although most playoff games are generally played on Saturdays in Montana high school football, game times can be moved if both schools are agreeable to it, and Twin Bridges officials were receptive to moving the game to Friday.

Koskela said the Blue Hawks had two goals going into last week’s game with Seeley. “We accomplished both of our goals,” he said. “We of course wanted to win and secondly, we wanted the shutout to make sure we stayed ahead of Mission.”

Mission and Thompson Falls ended up tied at 7-1 in conference, but the Hawks won the tie-breaker based on points allowed to common opponents. In the final tally on that score, the Hawks allowed only 126 points while the Bulldogs surrendered 162.

Surrendering nothing Friday, the Blue Hawks stung the Blackhawks right away as junior Alex Vogelsang gathered in the opening kickoff at the 10-yard line, reversed field and streaked 70 yards for the touchdown, giving the Blue Hawks the go-ahead, stay-ahead points only 13 seconds into the game.

Thompson Falls went on to totally dominate the first quarter, which ended with the Blue Hawks leading 27-0. The Hawks’ super signal-caller Trey Fisher scored the second Falls TD on a six-yard run and stellar running back Nate Wilhite the third on a 13-yard scamper.

After a bad snap on a punt attempt gave Thompson Falls the ball at Seeley’s one-yard line, Fisher scored on a one-yard plunge for the Blue Hawks’ final touchdown of the first quarter. Carson Alexander converted three of four point-after kicks in the quarter.

Wilhite scored again on a 32-yard run and Fisher passed a 22-yard scoring strike to Roman Sparks as the Hawks expanded the lead to 40-0 by halftime.

Justin Miller and Jordan Fisher scored on five-yard touchdown runs to complete game scoring in the second half.

Wilhite finished with 70 yards rushing to lead the Hawk ground attack, Trey Fisher added 63 and Justin “The Bus” Miller 55 bone-crunching yards from his fullback position, when he wasn’t busy clearing running lanes from his lineman position.

Also one of the best defensive players in the Western Conference in addition to being one of the most dynamic offensive performers, Trey Fisher stacked up a team-high 13 tackles from his middle linebacker position, including two quarterback sacks, giving him an amazing total of 12 for the season.

Dakota Irvine added seven tackles, Wilhite five and Brandon Zimmerman and Matt Duplechain three each.

Koskela wants to change things up a little in this week’s game with Twin Bridges.

“We are going to wrinkle up our offense a little this week, look at doing a few things a little differently,” he said. “We want to start putting things in our back pocket that maybe we can use later.”

It’s been a great season of football for the Blue Hawks so far and Koskela wants to extend the season as far as he can, all the way to the State 8-Man championship game if he has his way.

“I couldn’t be prouder of a team than I am of these guys,” he said. “This is an awesome bunch of guys, they have stuck together through thick and thin this season. I’m excited to see how we do in the playoffs.”

If the Hawks defeat Twin Bridges, the next game would probably be a quarterfinal date at Fairview, the undefeated, No. 1 team in Montana.

Thompson Falls was ranked No. 7 in the final 406mtsports.com 8-Man poll. Western Conference champion Clark Fork was No. 3 and Mission No. 5 in that poll.