Tigercats outrun SJE, 60-18

The LaCrosse-Washtucna/Kahlotus Tigercats ran away with a 60-18 win against St. John-Endicott on Friday, Oct. 19. Along with the win, the Tigercats also celebrated 10 athletes during senior night.

The Tigercats put the first points on the board with a 12-yard run by senior athlete, Alec Fleming. Fleming lead the team in scoring and yards, accumulating 109 yards on nine carries, scoring two touchdowns and three, two-point conversions, all in the first half.

Fleming jogged into the end zone for the first time with 7:33 remaining on the clock, before running past the SJE defense to earn the extra points.

Celebrating his inaugural appearance for the Tigercats, Julio Dominguez Perez booted the ball to the opposing end zone during the kickoff. Wade West received the kick and returned the ball for a 95-yard touchdown.

“This was his first game being eligible. He can kind of put the ball where he wants to,” head coach Jeff Nelson said about Perez. “We just aren’t used to running that far down field.”

Perez is an exchange student who recently tried out for the Tigercats team, and his ability to kick caught Nelson’s attention. His consistency during the game helped limit the amount of good field position for the SJE team throughout the evening.

After the kickoff return, the Tigercats went on their own scoring spree, led by Fleming. His next touchdown was off a 25-yard run and Fleming also ran in for two points.

With six minutes left in the first quarter, Sam Harder intercepted an Eagles pass and ran it back for a 45-yard touchdown. The run attempt for the extra points failed, and the quarter ended with a score of 22-6.

The Tigercats scoring did not slow down in the second quarter as the team added an impressive 24 points to the scoreboard. The Eagles were unable to score during the second quarter.

Quarterback Joey Guske earned his first points of the game with a one-yard run into the end zone. Fleming ran the ball in for two points with 8:43 remaining in the half.

With pressure from the Tigercats defense, the Eagles turned over the ball, giving the LWK team excellent field position. Harder scored his second touchdown on a 20-yard run and Johnathan Holdren snuck into the end zone for the extra points.

The final touchdown of the half came off of a three-yard run by Sawyer Hostetler, who made his mid-season debut after missing a game due to injury. With the two-point conversion being made by Harder off of a pass from Guske, the Tigercats went into halftime with a 40-point advantage.

Due to the 40-point lead at halftime, the entire second half was running clock. During the second half, Nelson allowed all of the sidelined athletes, except eighth graders and freshmen, to have playing time.

“Our younger kids have improved greatly since the beginning of the year, they weren’t nervous out there,” Nelson said.

During the second half, the Tigercats leading runner was Kaese Ramos, a 5-foot-2-inch sophomore, weighing in at 110 pounds.

“He got to carry the ball the entire second half and part of the first half,” Nelson said about Ramos. “He’s quick, he makes the defenders miss.”

The Tigercats scored twice in the third quarter but would remain scoreless in the fourth. The first touchdown of the second half went to Bo Rice off of an 18-yard run.

The Eagles scored a single touchdown in the third quarter with a 55-yard run by West. The Eagles were unable to earn the extra points.

During the kickoff return from the Eagles, Fleming received the ball and before Eagles’ defenders could get a hold of him, he pitched the ball to Harder. With the sudden change in direction, Harder was able to run by defenders and score the final points for the Tigercats with an 80-yard run.

The Eagles would score a touchdown in the fourth quarter to bring the final score to 60-18 in favor of the Tigercats. The Tigercats have two more league games remaining and face the undefeated Liberty Christian team Friday with the game beginning at 2 p.m.

Nelson said the focus for the team moving forward is reducing the amount of turnovers, which has been an ongoing issue for the Tigercats team. The team fumbled four times in the game against the Eagles and Nelson said without improvement, it could be their downfall.

“We better stay focused. We’re getting back to basics this week,” Nelson said. “I’m not concerned about what they do compared to what we need to do.”

“We don’t have anything to lose, we have to leave it all out on the field,” Nelson added. “There’s a lot of pride on the line.”

The Tigercats play the afternoon game at Liberty Christian and a win would guarantee playoff competition for the Tigercats. The Tigercats have to win one of the next two games in order to continue on to the playoffs.