Cromwell Heads Back To The State Tournament

Wes Vork-NSO

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Nov 5

Wes Vork-NSO

MCGREGOR – The line often heard from coaches and players is that we need to turn our season around. A lot of time it is just something to say amidst a long losing streak. Not so with the Cromwell Cardinals. The Cards started the season 2-4 and faced their final two regular season games as well as all playoff games on the road. Since that point Cromwell has reeled off four straight victories, the latest of which being a 21-0 shutout over #1 seed McGregor. With the victory Cromwell captured the Section 5 9-man championship, sending them to the state tournament for a second straight season.

A big key to the turnaround has been the defense. In the four losses, the Cardinals gave up 89 points. In the past four games they have held their opponents to 30 total points, not giving up more than 12 per contest. That number is even more impressive when considering they faced the #2 and #1 seeded teams on the road.

According to Cromwell head Coach Jeff Gronner, getting healthy was the key, “We had some guys banged up, so it is a combination of getting healthy and playing better. Having everyone back not only makes a difference in games, but allows them to get reps together in practice.” “ McGregor is a great team; they average about 48 points a game, so to shut them out says something about how hard our kids worked.” Gronner added.

Against the Mercs, Cromwell scored first, taking advantage of good field position made possible by a great

punt return by Jordan Suhonen and a 15 yard penalty against McGregor. On the scoring play Suhonen called his own number and sprinted to the left side of the end zone from two yards out. Spencer Wilenius tacked on the first of his three extra points and the Cardinals led 7-0 after one quarter.

In the second quarter, the Cardinals again started with good field position when McGregor turned the ball over on downs at their own 40 yd line. Two plays later Suhonen scored on a nifty 56 yard run to put Cromwell up 14-0. Still in the second quarter Cromwell went on a more conventional 80 yard drive, capped off with a 1 yard Mike Hedin run, giving the Cards a 21-0 lead going into the break.

After halftime the Cromwell defense stepped up and did not allow the Mercs to get going offensively, with the bulk of the game played on the McGregor end of the field, leading to a scoreless second half.

With the win Cromwell heads to Public Schools Stadium to face the Rangers of Mountain-Iron-Buhl on Saturday Nov 13 at noon. It was on that same PSS field last year that Cromwell’s starting quarterback Suhonen suffered a broken leg in the second quarter and the Cards lost to Ada-Borup in the first round of the state tournament 38-14.

On the play, an 11 yard first down run Suhonen broke both bones in his leg and was taken to the hospital by ambulance. Coach Gronner couldn’t be happier for his quarterback to get a second shot at the state tournament. “He broke both bones (in his leg) and had several other setbacks, the kid missed all of basketball and track seasons because of it, but he worked hard to get back to the point of being able to play. He is such a competitor.”

When asked if he was nervous about returning, Suhonen didn’t seem to be bothered at all, telling NSO, “I am very excited, actually. I just love playing football. We want to get to the dome and we know getting there involves going to PSS first. We will work hard and play hard and hopefully good things will happen.”

Wes Vork can be reached at wes@northlandsportsonline.com