Clovers walloped by Patriots 53-0

Saturday, October 12, 2013
Cloverdale senior Andrew Howard stiffarms an opponent during a rush earlier this year. Howard had 15 carries for 41 yards on Friday. (Banner Graphic/GRANT WIEMAN)

CLOVERALE -- Any football program looking to turn things around is going to experience a few growing pains. Unfortunately for the Cloverdale Clovers, they seemed to experience all of its growing pains at once Friday against Owen Valley.

After seeing improvement through seven weeks of the season, Cloverdale hit a roadblock against a big, physical Patriots squad Friday, falling 53-0.

The Clovers struggled from the opening kickoff and first-year head coach Jarrod Duff acknowledged Friday wasn't his team's night.

"I felt like we've steadily improved each week and we took some steps back this week," he said. "It's like I told them at halftime, and tell them anytime something goes wrong -- when you're a man, you can either be a man and step up and work on getting better. Or you can be a little boy and pout about it, feel sorry for yourselves and we're not going to do that.

"Tonight is just one of those nights -- it's hard to explain. I felt like we had a solid game plan coming in and I felt like we'd play better. I think the kids expected to come out and play better. Obviously we didn't do a good enough job as a coaching staff getting these guys ready to play and we didn't play as well as we have. I don't know any other way to put it."

The Clovers forced the Patriots to turn the ball over on down on its first drive of the game and looked strong. But two plays later, CHS quarterback Mark Osmialowski was picked off to set up Owen Valley's first touchdown of the night.

Cloverdale had its chances in the first half, but it seemed like every time the Clovers got some momentum going, something would happen deflate CHS.

Owen Valley managed to find the endzone five times in the opening half, all coming on the ground. Patriots quarterback Evan Wood accounted for three touchdowns.

Things didn't improve in the second half as the Clovers were outscored 20-0. One bright spot for the Cloverdale faithful was the fact their team refused to quit. Instead of packing it in and calling it a night, senior running back Andrew Howard led the CHS offense and ripped off a few longs runs in the fading minutes of the game.

Howard led the team with 41 yards, with Ethan Boyd chipping in 28 yards. The Cloverdale passing attack struggled on the night with Osmialowski tossing three interceptions before being knocked out of the game late in the third quarter.

Now Cloverdale will need to switch its focus to a North Putnam squad that's coming to town looking for one thing and one thing only -- it's first win of the season. Duff said this week of practice leading into the regular season finale will hinge on how his seniors step up.

"We need some leadership from our seniors," Duff said. "The heart and soul of our football team is Andrew Howard. To still see that kid, even though he's hurt, to see him out there running hard and upset that we're not getting the job done -- that's encouraging.

"We just need kids like Andrew to continue to be good leaders like he has been. We need him and the other senior to lead, work hard in practice and to work on getting better every day like we talk about."

The last time a winless North Putnam team came was way back in 1995. However, Duff won't let his team look past the Cougars and knows his team has its work cut out for them.

"North Putnam's a good team," he said. "We watched them on film and they are a good football team. ... They don't look like a team that hasn't won a game."

He went on to note the similarities both teams shared heading into week nine.

"They've kind of suffered the same kinds of things we have and been inconsistent at times," Duff said, "But you know, we just have to block better, we have to tackle better, we have to execute better -- we have to do the little things better. We talk about it all the time, you have to, as an individual, do your job."

Cloverale will host North Putnam Friday at 7 p.m.



At Cloverdale
Owen Valley 14 19 13 7 -- 53
Cloverdale 0 0 0 0 -- 0

Scoring
First Quarter
OV 9:11 -- Wood 15-yard run (Roberts kick good) 7-0
OV 1:53 -- Wood 1-yard run (Roberts kick good) 14-0

Second Quarter
OV 11:56 -- Sparks 1-yard run (kick failed), 20-0
OV 9:23 -- Wood 39-yard run (kick failed), 26-0
OV 4:40 -- Sparks 4-yard run (Roberts kick good), 33-0

Third Quarter
OV 6:21 -- Wood 54 yard pass to Shouse (kick failed), 39-0
OV 4:10 -- King 58 yard pass to Strong (Roberts kick good), 46-0

Fourth Quarter
OV 10:53 -- Summerlot 1 yard run (Roberts kick good), 53-0

Individual Stats
Owen Valley (5-3, 4-2 WIC)
Rushing (38-262): Wood 8-96 3TD, Townsend 11-68, Sparks 6-28 2TD, Sims 3-6, Hendershot 5-21, King 2-15, Summerlot 2-13 TD, Woodall 1-15
Passing (11-16, 246): Wood 9-14 174 yards TD, King 2-2 72 yards TD
Receiving: Shouse 7-130 TD, Strong 1-58 TD, Boyd 1-28, Daniel 1-16, Townsend 1-14

Cloverdale (1-7, 0-4 WCC)
Rushing (30-78): Howard 15-41, Boyd 8-28, Warren 5-9, Osmialowski 2-0
Passing: Omialowski 4-12 25 yards 3 INT
Receiving: Warren 2-18, Boyd 2-7

Respond to this story

Posting a comment requires free registration: