Marial Deng (Photo by Cameron Carlson)
FORT TOTTEN — After getting routed by North Prairie in a high-scoring affair, the Indians felt they didn’t best utilize their star wide receiver.
Senior Marial Deng, a UND commit, had just two catches for 14 yards all night. Four Winds, splitting quarterback duties between Dayson Dubois and Kaleb Keja, was heavy on the run game in a 56-30 loss to the Cougars on Friday.
“I hate to say this, but we were a little disappointed in Kaleb tonight,” Four Winds co-head coach Travis Mertens said. “I know he’s battling through some injuries, and I get it. But I just feel like you’ve got to be able to give your Division-I athlete, Marial, a couple plays. … And you can’t say it any way other than, ‘Throw it to Marial.’ And we still are not throwing it to Marial.”
The loss ended a four-game winning streak for the Indians, who fell to 5-2 with two games left in the regular season. North Prairie is one of the teams they’re fighting for a playoff spot. The Cougars improved to 5-2.
“That was a butt-whooping tonight that we hadn’t had in a couple weeks,” Mertens said.
North Prairie was led by a dual rushing attack from quarterback Jonathan Mears and running back Layton Olson. Mears ran for 173 yards unofficially, while Olson totaled more than 200 yards of offense.
In their previous game, the Cougars scored 36 points against No. 1 New Rockford-Sheyenne/Maddock — the most the Rockets had allowed in over two years.
“That’s a team that’s playing really, really good football right now,” Mertens said. “They gave New Rockford a fight. They gave us a fight. And it just didn’t seem like we quite matched them punch-for-punch. … I was hoping we could hold them in the 30s.”
The Indians started Dubois at quarterback. He responded to an opening score from North Prairie by carrying the ball eight times for 22 yards on Four Winds’ first possession. He finished a collective 51-yard touchdown drive with a two-yard run into the end zone.
Dubois also had the two-point conversion. It was tied, 8-8, nearing the end of the first quarter.
Four Winds forced a turnover on downs after a sack by Keja. But two plays later, Keja threw an interception. Fast forward two more plays, and North Prairie’s Olson ran the ball 54 yards for a go-ahead touchdown.
With Dubois back at quarterback, he had a 30-yard run into the red zone. Keja ran the remaining 11 yards. His younger brother Kyson picked up the two-point conversion, putting the Indians ahead 16-14 in the second quarter.
Dubois ran for 58 yards in the first half. The Indians’ offense still only included one reception by Deng.
“We’re usually bigger and stronger than a lot of guys up front, so we like to lean on the run game,” Mertens said. “But in games like this, it seems like sometimes you do have to go to your star player [Deng], and I don’t know if we gave him enough opportunities tonight.”
The Cougars ran wild on Four Winds to take a commanding lead by halftime. After a 26-yard touchdown reception by Olson to retake the lead, North Prairie recovered an onside kick at midfield. A few plays later, Mears ran it 16 yards for a score.
Olson also had a four-yard carry to make it 36-16. Mears and Olson each totaled over 100 yards of offense in the first half alone.
“They sustained that intensity a little longer than we did,” Four Winds co-head coach Mark Bishop said. “When you’ve got that momentum, it helps you keep the intensity up, when you’re tired and things aren’t going right. It just happened to bounce in their way, and they got up a couple scores. … If you could probably take that second quarter out, it might be a different game.”
The Indians had to punt on their first possession of the second half. When North Prairie got the ball back, Olson ran it 64 yards to set up a 12-yard touchdown run for Mears.
With 2:06 left in the third quarter, Four Winds finally got back in the points column on a 14-yard pass from Dubois to Zach Langstaff. It cut the deficit to 42-24.
Olson added two more touchdowns in the fourth quarter, including a 52-yarder.
“We did a bad job of tackling,” Mertens said. “We missed a lot of tackles where we probably should have had them. Credit to them for making our guy miss — and then, you know, the rest is history.”
Four Winds got one touchdown back on a 29-yard run by Dubois. He was tackled for a loss three times in the second half, but he still ended up running 46 yards and 104 total.
Keja was limited to nine total rushing yards, with none in the second half. Landon Jackson and Langstaff helped out with 61 and 38 yards, respectively.
But again, the future Fighting Hawk was left mostly out of the equation. Four Winds attempted only a few downfield passes to Deng that went for naught.
“Kudos to [the Cougars]. Their superstars, I would say, kind of showed up,” Mertens said. “And maybe ours — I wouldn’t say ours didn’t, but we couldn’t match their explosiveness.”
Four Winds finishes the regular season with a pair of road games. It heads into a critical region matchup next Friday, with a trip to play St. John (2-5). This will be a particularly important game considering the Indians have to finish their season against the No. 1 Rockets, who have won 19 consecutive games dating back to last year.
“You play the No. 1 team in the state, they’re gonna show you what you need to work on,” Bishop said.
Four teams from Region 2 get to make the playoffs. NR-S/M (7-0) and North Border (6-1) have pretty much locked up their spots; the final two places will come down to Four Winds, North Prairie and Nelson County.
With Nelson County at 4-3, and Four Winds and and North Prairie both at 5-2, the Indians’ chances of at least making the four seed are looking okay. But they need to bounce back against St. John.
“We’ve got to continue dominating up front, wearing teams down,” Mertens said. “That’s gonna be our best way for success from here on out. You get into playoff football: The weather gets crappy; people don’t like to necessarily hit as much. And we have a line that can wear you down. But when we get those opportunities to make a play with Marial, we’ve got to do that, too.
“We’ve had two pretty good battles the last couple weeks. But that’s region football. That’s not excuses. That’s what makes you a good team, and what’s gonna eventually carry into the playoffs.”
