Patriots cruise to district win over Sedan

[Janet Harrington]

(Taken from the Daily Reporter, Sunday, october 15, 2006 page B-4)

HOWARD - Since an 0-2 start to the season, the West Elk High School football team has been picking up steam heading towards the end of the regular season.  And what a way for the Patriots to open up Class 2-1A-District 6, with an impressive victory over its biggest rival.
  Colby Linder rushed for 133 yards and two touchdowns to lead West Elk to a 48-6 blowout win against Sedan in the district opener for both teams Friday night.
  "This was a big, big win for us," said Patriot football coach Chris Haag.  "I thought the guys played well.  REally ever since the first quarter of the Olpe game, we've played pretty darn well.  Tonight, we were able to get our running game established.  In the past, it's mainly been our passing game.  Sedan is a good team, but we played hard all game long with a lot of intensity and came out with a big win."
  West Elk has now won fourt of its last five games in improving to 4-3 overall and 1-0 in district play.  The Patriots will next take on Oswego-52-6 loser Oxford in its home finale Friday.
  As for Sedan, it has now dropped two straight games-excluding a victory against the Field Kindley junior varsity last week that did not count toward its official record-to fall to 3-3 overall and 0-1 in district action.  With their backs against the wall in pursuit of a possible playoff spot, the Blue Devils will entertain Oxford on Friday.
  The Patriots took control of Friday's contest early on with a pair of first-quarter touchdowns.  Brett Koop started things off with a 39-yard touchdown run, followed by a two-point conversion run from Linder, and quarterback C. J. Madison extended the lead to 14-9 on a two-yard dive into the end zone later in the period.
  Linder got into the action early in the second period.  The 6-1 senior tailback, who carried the ball 18 times for 133 yards while also finishing with three receptions for 53 yards, ran into the end zone from five yards out.  Koop then extended the Patriots' lead to 26-0 by halftime on a one-yard run.
  West Elk, which had not played Sedan in the previous two seasons after its departure to the Lyon County League, put the game well out of reach after the break.  Linder scored his second touchdown on an eight-yard run, and Madison latger tossed an eight-yard strike to Blair Lowe for six to put the Patriot lead up to 42-0 after three quarters.
  The Blue Devils did manage to end the shutout in the fourth period on a five-yard run by Brent Davis, but West Elk put the capper on the game with a two-yard score from taylor Lowe for the final margin.
  "I really feel like we've got the momentum right now." Haag said.  "But we can't have a letdown now against Oswego.  We still need to fine tune some things.  We needed this one.  Now we just need to take care of business the next two weeks.
  WEHS, which has battled through adversity with injuries all season long, finished with one of its best offensive performances with 402 total yards, including 233 on the ground and 169 through the air from madison, who was 10-0f-17 passing no interceptions and one touchdown.
  Sedan had just 204 yards in the contest, with 114 of that coming on the ground.

                 West Elk 48, Sedan 8
                                                       SHS                 WESH
First Downs                                           8                      16
Rushes-Yards                                 33-114                34-233
Passing Yards                                       90                    169
Total yards                                         204                    402
Pass Com-Att-Int                             5-12-1                 10-17-0
Punts-Avg.                                     2-25-0                   1-39-0
Fumbles-Lost                                      3-2                       2-0
Penalties-Yards                                   5-40                     7-65
SEDAN                                          0    0    0                 6  -  6
WEST ELK                                    14  12   16                6  - 48
                                    SCORING PLAYS
WEHS - Koop 39 run (Linder run)
WEHS - Madison 2 run (Run failed)
WEHS - Linder 5 run (Pass failed)
WEHS - Koop 1 run (Run failed)
WEHS - Linder 8 run (Koop run)
WEHS - B. Lowe 8 pass from Madison (Nordquist run)
SHS - Davis 5 run (Run failed)
WEHS - T. Lowe 2 run (Run failed)