The midpoint of the 2014 season has arrived, and the Central Lakes College Raiders continued their perfect march, moving to 4-0 overall with a 35-32 Northern Division win over Fond du Lac on a day that mother nature dealt everything that she could offer at Findorff Athletic Complex.
The 16th-ranked Raiders, led by Athen Ashton's 65 rushing yards, and Jake Faber's 242 passing yards, jumped out to a 14-0 lead early in the first quarter.
However, CLC needed a fourth-quarter stand from its defense to preserve the 3-point win.
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CLC 35, Fond du Lac 32
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- Division: CLC 2-0.
- Overall: CLC 4-0.
- Next: CLC vs. Vermilion at Ely 1:30 pm Saturday.
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The Raiders' offense failed to hit 40 points for the first time this season, while the defense gave up 20 straight points, but also sacked Fond du Lac quarterback Travis Brown 11 times.
Bill Desrocher recorded three sacks while Max Strand and Jake Kassulker each finished with two. Josh Mantel collected 10 total tackles for the game to lead the Raiders in that category.
Sitting on a 35-32 lead late in the fourth quarter, the Raider defense was looking to hold off a final charge from the Thunder offense. With the ball at the Raiders' 28, the game was suspended when lightning was spotted in the area with 4:37 remaining.
After a delay of approximately 40 minutes, the game resumed with Fond du Lac having a first down.
"We were chomping at the bit to get back out there but coach told us to keep our composure and play smart and we came back out and did that," said CLC linebacker Josh Mantel.
The Raiders' defense stood up to the challenge, allowing the Thunder just six yards on four tries to put the game away.
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"Our guys didn't want to go in and that is the mentally strong nature of our defense that wanted to stay out there and just finish what they started," said CLC head coach Greg Medeck.
At the start of the game, it appeared CLC would roll to a win as it scored two first-quarter touchdowns. The first came on a 5-yard run from Ashton, and a 1-yard run from Jake Faber.
After a Fond du Lac touchdown closed out the quarter, Faber connected with Kieran Johnson on to put the Raiders' lead at 21-7.
CLC gave up the next 19 points to trail 26-21 with 12:03 left in the third. The Raiders' offense responded with two scoring passes from Faber to Steve Wroblewski and Johnson to take the lead at 35-26.
"The flow of the game was just hard to put your finger on," said Medeck. "We would make some good plays and then also make a lot mistakes. It went back and forth quite a bit."
The Thunder wouldn't go away as Te'Vaughn Hurse scored his second touchdown of the day at 12:19 to pull Fond du Lac to within the final score.
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The Raiders' defense may have had their best statistical day of the season, giving up just 274 total yards, and special teams performed well as they blocked two extra-point attempts.
Fond du Lac 7 13 6 6 - 32
Central Lakes 14 7 14 0 - 35
First quarter
CLC - Athen Ashton 5 run (Fafa Asante kick) 11:19
CLC - Jake Faber 1 run (Asante kick) 7:33
FDL - Tyrone Woods 20 pass from Travis Brown (Jalen Simmons kick) 2:54
Second quarter
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CLC - Kieran Johnson 3 pass from Faber (Asante kick) 8:18
FDL - Brown 1 run (Simmons kick) 6:42
FDL - Te'Vaughn Hurse 2 run (Simmons kick) :46
Third quarter
FDL - Jordan Morris 57 pass from Brown (kick failed) 12:03
CLC - Steve Wroblewski 8 pass from Faber (Asante kick) 8:17
CLC - Johnson 26 pass from Faber (Asante kick) 3:29
Fourth quarter
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FDL - Hurse 4 run (kick failed) 12:19
Team statistics
Rushes-yards: CLC 43-95, FDL 38-39
Pass comp-att-int-yds: CLC 23-40-2-242, FDL 16-31-0-235
Total offense: CLC 337, FDL 274
Individual leaders
Rushing: CLC-Athen Ashton 25-65, Kyle Johanneck 7-31, Jake Faber 7-1, Elias Arlington 2-(-2); FDL-Te'Vaughn Hurse 15-73, Jarmal Kendrick 4-27, Jamie Fore 3-11, Jalen Simmons 1 (-3), Josh Bender 3 (-3), Travis Brown 12 (-66)
Passing: CLC-Jake Faber 23-40-2-242; FDL-Travis Brown 14-26-0-218, Jamie Fore 2-4-0-17
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Receiving: CLC-Steve Wroblewski 4-65, Sam Moriarty 8-64, Beau Wilhelm 4-45, Kieran Johnson 2-29, Barron Taylor 1-22, Elias Arlington 3-17, Athen Ashton 1-0; FDL-Jordan Morris 6-116, Jimmy Walker 3-51, Damon Barnes 5-43, Tyron Woods 2-25
