POYNETTE - For the first 24 minutes Poynette's football team limited Lodi's offense and its heralded senior running back Keith McBride.

The final 24 minutes were a different story all together.

McBride ran for a career-high 299 yards on 31 carries and three touchdowns as Lodi beat Capitol North Conference rival Poynette 37-13 Friday in Poynette.

"It means a lot because now we're playoff eligible, we're 3-0 against Poynette on varsity," said McBride of the win. "Yeah, it means a lot to the whole town, too."

McBride ran for 86 yards on 11 carries in the first half, but 54 of those yards came on a touchdown run late in the second quarter.

The Indians couldn't continue the effort in the second half, where McBride ran for 213 yards and could have run for more if not for a handful of holding penalties.

"We just figured out what plays were working, figured out what's going on," McBride said. "We tried it inside mainly in the first half and that didn't seem to work too well. We started going outside more and that's where all the yards came from."

Poynette senior tailback Brett Rice and McBride are considered two of the area's top running backs, but Lodi's defense held Rice to just 77 yards on 14 carries, including a 24-yard touchdown scamper late in the first half.

"Any time you lose it's disappointing," Poynette coach Todd Anderson said. "When you don't play well and you lose... it kind of gives you a knot in your stomach. When you don't play poorly and you get beat like we did tonight, it's frustrating. But when you know you played as well as you can and gave your best, it doesn't hurt quite so much."

Lodi capitalized on a first-quarter turnover when Blue Devils junior Jordan Robertson picked off Poynette quarterback Cody Odegaard and returned it to the Poynette 31. Lodi got to the 3-yard line but settled for a Richie Hamann 20-yard field goal that gave it a 3-0 lead.

Lodi had just 30 rushing yards in the first quarter, but McBride got loose midway through the second quarter when he took a handoff up the middle, broke a handful of tackles and outran the Indians defense for a 54-yard TD that extended Lodi's lead to 10-0.

Rice answered just in time for Poynette. On 4th-and-1 at the Lodi 24, Rice took a handoff up the middle and scored to cut Poynette's deficit to 10-7 heading into the half.

Any momentum the Indians picked up from the scoring drive quickly evaporated after halftime as Lodi scored on its first two possessions in the second half, both long, time-consuming drives.

Poynette, meanwhile, ran just 18 offensive plays and had the ball for 7:17 in the entire second half. More than two of those minutes came on its last drive with the game already in hand.

"The (Lodi) score to start the second half was a little deflating, to not get the ball until there was about four minutes left in the quarter was deflating and then to go three-and-out was deflating," Anderson said.

Poynette went three-and-out on three of its five second-half possessions.

"I think because they only go one way on their offensive line and we go both, I think our guys were kind of getting tired at the end because we don't sub as much," Odegaard said. "They just keep getting fresh and staying fresh. It's kind of hard for us to keep going and going."

Lodi quarterback Lucas Stronach scored on an option keeper from 13 yards out on Lodi's first drive of the third quarter and McBride capped an 11-play, 80-yard drive on Lodi's next possession with a nine-yard touchdown run.

Odegaard brought Poynette back to 23-13 midway through the fourth when he found Adam Krumberger in the corner of the end zone for a 25-yard touchdown reception but Poynette missed a two-point conversion that would've made it a one-possession game.

"I was nervous as a son-of-a-gun there, they just kept coming back," Lodi coach Dave Puls said. "That missed two-point conversion was big."

McBride ended all thoughts of a comeback a little over one minute later when he broke to the outside and ran untouched for a 53-yard TD run. Lodi's Tyler Caldwell capped the scoring with a 1-yard touchdown run late in the fourth.

LODI 37, POYNETTE 13

Lodi 3 7 6 21 - 37

Poynette 0 7 0 6 - 13

L - FG Hamann 20, 1st 01:10

L - McBride 54 run (Hamann kick), 2nd 03:57

P - Rice 24 run (Odegard kick), 2nd 01:08

L - Stranach 13 run (pass failed), 3rd 06:15

L - McBride 9 run (Hamann kick), 4th 11:53

P - Krumberger 25 pass from Odegard (pass failed), 4th 07:49

L - McBride 53 run (Hamann kick), 4th 06:36

L - Miller 1 run (Hamann kick), 4th 02:34

TEAM STATS LO PO

First downs 14 9

Total Net Yards 428 236

Rushes-yards 50-399 26-118

Passing 29 118

Comp-Att-Int 4-11-0 11-23-2

Penalties-Yards 5-55 2-20

Fumbles-Lost 0-0 0-0

INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS

RUSHING: LO - McBride 31-299. PO - Rice 14-77. PASSING: LO - Stronach 4-11-29. PO - Odegaard 11-23-118. RECEIVING: LO - Bauman 3-19. PO - Wood 3-28.

kmorales@capitalnewspapers.com

 

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