Adam Crater Boards 14 as Mustang Boys Win Handily Over Trojans

North Nodaway’s boys won handily 56-26 over winless Nodaway-Holt in a game that was not as close as the score. The Mustangs played with their subs after the first 5:18 of the game, with North Nodaway up 19-0. The reserves got plenty of experience the rest of the way, building the lead up to 33 points at the midway point of the third quarter.

Nodaway-Holt came into Monday’s game winless, only managed four points in one game, and scored 30 or more only twice this year. All of their losses this year have been by 30 or more points.

North Nodaway started off the way they were supposed to as Cody Wood hit Ryan Riley for three. Wood added a free throw and a steal to make it 6-0. Arron Coleman got loose in transition, then Karson Oberhauser got behind the red shirts and took a pass from Coleman to make it 10-0. Ryan Riley threw to Tyler Bix for three after Tyler had gotten a steal. Arron Coleman hit Ryan Riley backdoor, and Coleman’s second-chance putback made it 19-0 at the 2:42 mark.

After that, Coach Jake Shipman pulled most of his starters out; he went with four subs and one starter until the midway point of the second, and then gave his starters the rest of the night off. Last year, we casually mentioned a one-sided score to him and he responded, “What’s the point? What do they have to prove?” True to his philosophy, he took the pressure off and let his subs get varsity experience.
Each coach has different philosophies regarding one-sided scores in their team’s favor. At the other extreme was Cameron Football coach Randy Schupe, who managed the Dragons during the 1971 campaign, the last for the Dragons in the GRC. At that time, the St. Joseph Gazette had the Keith Young football rankings, which rewarded schools based on margin of victory. Cameron proceeded to run up the score on nearly every opponent that year; they beat doormat Gallatin 90-0 in a game they had to forfeit because they had used an ineligible player. They beat another team 88-0, and they beat Worth County 75-6. Princeton was having a rare down year and was crushed 57-12; an irate Princeton fan punched Schupe after the game. Cameron left the GRC after that year. The late Claude Samson would play his starters three quarters no matter what. “They play three quarters, because they are the varsity,” he would say.

North Nodaway fans got to take a look at some of the players behind the scenes pushing the starters. Senior Adam Crater anchored the defense for North Nodaway; an undersized post, he was a force on the boards with 14. Andrew Blackford showed some promise for the future despite his small size; he got a double double with 17 points and 10 boards. Hunter Carlson, who regularly topped 20 boards a night last year in junior high, showed he was getting better every single night; he got off to a slow start, but got better as the game progressed and got 6 points and 7 boards. Logan Keho had 6 boards. As a team, North Nodaway had 49 boards.

The rest turned out to be beneficial for the starters, as they were able to finish strong against Worth County despite falling seven points short, and they were able to pull away from South Holt in overtime in other games last week.