Steve Gress: Spartans improve as game goes on Comments
Chris McGowan was pretty honest after Friday night’s 55-35 loss to Thurston.
He knows that if his program is going to be able to compete against teams the caliber of Thurston this early in the season, they need to make a few changes.
“We’d hoped for better, we expected better,” McGowan said in the weightroom after addressing his team. “It’s very evident for us to prepare for an Endowment game against a good team … we have to maybe re-evaluate what we do in the summer to get ready or how you go about things.
“There’s reasons why teams win state championships and do well and their program has it all going on right now and they executed really well. It shines a light on the things we need to improve on.
Thurston was better all around on Friday. The Colts, who were state runner-ups to West Albany last year, used big plays to jump out to a 20-0 lead.
The Spartans finally started clicking on offense. They are running every play out of the shotgun this season and it seemed like they were just a step off early.
Senior QB Ross Orman completed 15 of 30 passes and was only intercepted once. He missed some receivers early, either leading them too far, or not far enough. He did throw three TD passes and finished with 228 yards.
“Yeah, we were rushing stuff on the offensive end and we settled down,” senior WR Spencer Huddleston said. “The defense just wasn’t there tonight and we have to work on that and have some things to improve on.”
Junior RB Dominic Wooten finished with 135 yards rushing on 18 carries, but 112 came on four carries.
It looked like the Spartans are beginning to click on offense, what they need is for the defense to improve.
Assistant coach Ron Sather told the team they played hard and that they improved as the game went on. They just made too many “major” mistakes.
So it’s back to the film room Saturday morning and back to work in practice with Wilsonville coming to town next Friday. The Wildcats lost 42-16 to Crater on Friday night.
I sure hope it’s not another three-hour game like tonight.
In other news:
West Albany lost it’s first regular season since reclassification in 2006. Sherwood knocked off the Bulldogs 22-20 in a battle of the No. 1 and No. 2 teams in the state.
OK, not sure who voted on that but oh well. Everyone likes to use rankings.
Crescent Valley looked good against Eagle Point it sounds like as the Raiders racked up 350-plus yards on the ground, with junior RB Andre Oglesby scoring twice and rushing for close to 150 yards.
Philomath lost 32-21 at Stayton as the Eagles scored 26 points in the second half.
And Santiam Christian knocked off Central Linn 27-6 as QB Brian Kessi threw for 253 yards.
In other MWC action, Silverton beat St. Helens 23-6, Springfield nipped Dallas 28-27, Lebanon smoked Parkrose 40-13 and South Albany nipped Willamette 21-20. No score was available for Woodburn and North Marion.
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