Lumberjack Thromp Blue Devils

  There was very little Cloquet could do wrong in their Friday night football game on the road in Virginia.  The Jacks scored on seven-of-ten drives and they held the Blue Devils scoreless on the evening as Cloquet romped 55-0 over Virginia.

  Cloquet opened the game with one of their only drives of the game that did not result in a touchdown.  After the Jacks went three and out they punted the ball to the Blue Devils who started their first drive on their own 48-yard line.  On the Blue Devils very first offensive play from scrimmage they fumbled the ball, Cloquet’s Dylan McIvor recovered on the 49-yard line, and one play later it was Henry Backus racing 49 yards for a touchdown and then the Jacks added a two-point conversion pass from Maxx Brenner to Austin Gotchnik giving Cloquet an 8-0 lead.

  With 2:21 left to play in the quarter the Jacks went up 14-0 on a nine-yard touchdown run by Gotchnik and following the Nick Niemi extra point boot Cloquet was up 15-0.

  The Cloquet defense again stiffened on the next series of plays and that allowed the Jacks to get the ball back with 34 seconds remaining in the first quarter.  The Lumberjacks took advantage of the opportunity and scored as time ran out on the quarter when Brenner took off on a 72-yard quarterback keeper for a touchdown making it 21-0 after the missed extra point kick.

  Cloquet kept the pressure on in the second quarter by scoring two more touchdowns the first of which was a four yard pass from Brenner to McIvor the second came when Gotchnik bolted in for a 24-yard touchdown run, both times Niemi booted the extra point giving the Jacks a 35-0 halftime lead.

  In the third quarter the Jacks lead went to 42-0 when Tayden Savage picked off a Darby Maloney pass and raced 19 yards for a score and Niemi added the extra point kick.  Cloquet added another third quarter touchdown when Nathan Weets handed the ball off to Ken Henagin who muscled in for a four-yard touchdown run making it 48-0 for Cloquet.

  The Lumberjacks final score came in the fourth quarter with 6:26 remaining when Weets hit Joseph Gotchnik for a 62-yard touchdown strike making it 55-0 following Niemi’s extra point boot.

  For the game the Jacks had 14 first downs compared to seven for the Blue Devils.  Cloquet also rolled up 432 yards of total offense on the night.

  The Lumberjacks improved to 5-1 overall on the season and 4-1 in the Sea Range Conference, while the Blue Devils drop to 0-6 on the season and 0-4 in conference play.