Jacks Pull Huge Comeback

Murphy’s Law states; “whatever can go wrong, will go wrong”.  That is exactly what the first half looked like for the Cloquet Lumberjacks football team on Friday night in Hermantown.  However, high school football is played with two halves and the Lumberjacks awoke from their funk in time to hang a 35-28 Sea Range Conference defeat on the Hawks.  The loss was the first in the conference since 2010.

  For Cloquet the first half was a massive mess with fumbles, ill timed penalties and just a general state of confusion.  For Hermantown?  It was a different story as the Hawks parlayed short field position into a 21-7 advantage on their home field.

  After each team got a stop defensively on their first series the Lumberjacks elected to try and pin the Hawks deep in their own end by punting the ball on fourth down near mid-field.  Instead of Hermantown being backed up to their own end zone speedster Thomas Madison took the punt and raced his way past the Jacks 91 yards for a score giving his team a 7-0 lead after the extra point kick by Cody McShane.

  Once Madison scored the game turned all Hermantown’s way for the rest of the first half.  On the ensuing possession by the Lumberjacks they fumbled the ball and Hermantown recovered deep in Cloquet territory and eventually Kole Zuidmulder powered into the end zone on a one-yard touchdown run giving the Hawks a 14-0 lead after the extra point boot.  Cloquet managed to pull some momentum back in the middle part of the second quarter after they drove all the way down field and got a one-yard touchdown run by Kyle Klatt and an extra point kick that cut the Hawks lead to 14-7, but their follies continued the rest of the second quarter with numerous fumbles and costly penalties.  Eventually it was Hermantown fullback James Lindberg who managed to weave his way through the Cloquet defense for an 80-yard touchdown run prior to halftime giving the Hawks a 21-7 edge and what appeared to be another home win.

  Things changed right from the opening possession of the second half for Cloquet as quarterback Nate Weets found wide receiver Brady Obeidzinski open for a 40-yard touchdown pass just barely a minute into the second half.  After Nick Niemi booted home the extra point the Jacks had cut the gap to 21-14, and more importantly, they had kicked Murphy’s Law to the curb and grabbed all the momentum back from the hometown squad.  From that point on the Cloquet line seized control of the game and eventually a one-yard touchdown run from Hunter Roberts evened the score at 21-21 with 2:18 remaining in the third quarter.

  Fourth quarter action saw more of the same from the Jacks as Zach Gerlach nabbed a Weets pass and slipped in from the 10-yard line that gave the Jacks a 27-21 edge early in the final stanza.  However, Cloquet missed the extra point attempt giving the Hawks spirits a short-lived lift.  That lift ended minutes later when Kyle Klatt blazed his way to the end zone from the 18-yard line to push Cloquet’s lead to 35-21 after a two-point conversion pass from Weets to Gerlach.

  Hermantown tried to get back in the game by driving the length of the field late in the fourth quarter on a drive that resulted in two things.  First it was a touchdown on a 10-yard run by Erik VanBaalen that cut the lead to 35-28, but it was the second thing that was most important and that was the fact that the Hawks took so long to go the length of the field that the game clock kept winding down to Cloquet’s favor.

  The win pushes Cloquet to 4-0 overall and 3-0 in the Sea Range Conference, while Hermantown drops to 3-1 overall and 2-1 in the conference.

Kerry Rodd can be reached at Kerry@northlandsportsonline.com