Four Winds football defeats North Star 36-8 for first victory

CANDO — It was a Lake Region matchup for Thursday night football.

And it was a tale of two teams in a similar position, both direly missing some crucial seniors who graduated last year. But the visitors, the Four Winds Indians, took over a freshly-groomed Cando football field and drowned the North Star Bearcats, 36-8.

“Especially with a young group that’s still growing, anytime you can get a win like that, maybe you start getting confidence,” Indians co-head coach Travis Martens said. “They start kind of figuring out what it takes to get a win… They’re just so inexperienced, so many new guys — if they get used to this feeling, they’ll keep showing up and they’ll keep working for us.”

Despite the lack of success in Game 1, Four Winds went into Week 2 with largely the same game plan. Quarterback Kashton Keja Jr. ran a keeper for a gain of 51 yards on the first play of the game.

But the Indians were sloppy to kick things off. They committed three false starts on the first drive, eventually turning it over on downs.

“We keep going back to that inexperience,” Mertens said. “And maybe there’s some things in practice we can probably preach a little harder, or different drills to clean that stuff up. But we will.”

North Star had no response, though. It gave the ball back to the Indians with a quick three-and-out.

Four Winds went back to business. Keja Jr. ran back-to-back keeper plays that secured a first down on the Bearcats’ 20-yard line. Marial Deng received a short pass and ran for another first down at the three.

After a gain of two, Keja walked into the end zone for the first score of the game. The two-point attempt was no good, but the Indians had a 6-0 lead.

“Kashton — or ‘Junjun,’ we call him — he’s a threat with the ball in his hands,” Mertens said. “And that’s why we like to give him the ball.”

North Star’s quarterback is junior Hunter Hagler. The now-upperclassman is trying to follow in the footsteps of his older brother Dane, who graduated from North Star last year after excelling in football, basketball, baseball and track and field.

Hagler did his best Keja Jr. impression on the next drive, executing a long run to the Indians’ 17-yard line. But there were just too many hitches in North Star’s offensive game Thursday night. A holding penalty put the Bearcats in a third-and-18 situation, and Hagler was taken down with a gain of only four on the next play.

North Star went for it on fourth down. But Deng, who made a key tackle earlier in the drive, intercepted the ball in the end zone.

“I did see him fill the alley a few times,” Indians co-head coach Mark Bishop said of Deng. “We set the edge, and the first player was there, and he just came down like a bat out of hell.”

Two more keeper runs for Keja Jr. led to another Four Winds touchdown. He overthrew a long pass attempt to Richard Cavanaugh early in the drive, but found success doing what he does best: running. The Indians kept finding routes through an overmatched North Star defense.

The two-point conversion was good this time, and it was a 14-0 Four Winds lead at the end of the first quarter.

“We started being a little more physical up front,” Mertens said. “We had to start a freshman [in the offensive line] today, Kyle [Charboneau]. He did a great job of filling in. He had great snaps the whole game. He had a couple mental lapses, but he’s a freshman. He’s getting his first start; he’s nervous. The minute our guys just buy in and figure it out together, we’re gonna be even better up front. And right now, that’s the best part of our game, is being able to run the ball.”

North Star tight end Ian Westlind made an early catch for a first down in the second quarter. But the Bearcats couldn’t sustain momentum. They recovered their own fumble, and then Hagler was sacked by freshman Judah Young deep in the backfield. It was a whopping third and 28.

Hagler couldn’t get a clean pass off on the next play, so North Star had to punt.

Four Winds’ fourth false start hurt it on the next drive. The Bearcats took the ball, and their drive had the makings of another source of frustration for the North Star sideline. But after Hagler was sacked again, this time by Wakinyanho Greybear, and a fumble cost the Bearcats two more yards, Hagler fired a 43-yard pass downfield to Brody Parker. It was almost a shot of lightning, seemingly random amidst the collection of incomplete passes and short-lived running plays.

Parker scored North Star’s first — and what ended up being its only — touchdown of the game. Rylen Anderson forced his way through the defense to convert the two-point attempt, and it was suddenly a game again at 14-8.

A different Keja, freshman Kaleb, briefly went in for Kashton at quarterback. He found another hole in the North Star defense and ran it to the 16-yard line. Four Winds committed another false start, but North Star committed pass interference in the end zone on the next play, bringing it to third and three.

With Kashton back in, he ran a keeper play for a touchdown. It quickly widened the margin back up, and the two-point was good to make it 22-8.

In the final minute of the first half, Parker caught a long pass at the 29-yard line, but the Bearcats couldn’t turn it in to anything. Deng caught his second interception right before halftime.

“I’m still waiting for him to say, ‘I’m the man. Nobody can handle me out here yet,’” Mertens said of Deng. “You see glimpses of it. That’s the thing. The minute he gets that confidence, he’s gonna take off. Maybe he’s not quite as explosive as his brother [Deng Deng], but I know he’s got that in him.”

North Star’s woes continued in the second half. Greybear recovered a fumble for a turnover, which led to another Keja Jr.-fueled touchdown. It was essentially a rout at 30-8.

“Wakinyanho ran it hard,” Bishop said of Greybear. “He’s looking like, ‘Give me the ball, Coach!’ He wants that thing, the way he ran tonight. And we’ll probably be giving him the ball more moving forward because of it.”

The Bearcats attempted back-to-back carries, both of which went for losses. Cavanaugh caught an interception for Four Winds, but otherwise, both teams mostly floated to the end of the quarter.

An early false start hurt the Indians at the start of the fourth quarter, but North Star had to punt again on fourth and long. Deng returned the punt all the way to the Bearcats’ 25-yard line.

From there, Keja Jr. and Greybear combined to run the ball into the end zone. The two-point attempt was no good, but the touchdown locked up the 36-8 victory with less than six minutes to go at that point.

The Indians can now say something for the first time this season: They are victors. And with a 1-1 record, they’ll look to turn themselves into a winning team next week at home against St. John.

“It’s definitely great to win,” Bishop said. “Because then those boys come back hungrier on Monday.”