CROMWELL— A trip to Cromwell did little to ease the Timberwolves’ gridiron struggles last Friday as they lost 32-8 to the Cardinals to drop to 1-4 on the season.
Cromwell scored at will in the early going, racking up an 18-0 lead by the end of the first quarter. They added seven more before the break to take a 25-0 lead into the locker room. The Wolves added a single touchdown on a short run by Erron Anderson early in the third quarter. Harry Simons caught a diving catch on a deflected pass from Mason Davis for the two-point conversion, but their would-be rally fizzled after that.
The Cardinals added a final capper to pad their final margin. Cromwell’s freshman quarterback had a strong night, with four touchdown passes, including an 85-yard strike to sophomore receiver Tanner Collman.
Ely’s Anderson tallied 94 rushing yards, while Davis rushed for 46 yards and completed five passes for 29 yards. Simons added 27 yards rushing and had 17 yards receiving to the mix.
On defense, Davis had eight tackles. “I thought Mason played pretty well defensively,” said Head Coach Louis Gerzin. “He came up from his safety position and made some nice tackles for us.”
Prijatel had 10 tackles, Deegan Richards had six tackles. Hegman added five stops and Ashton Cook had four tackles on the night.
“As a team, I thought we played better than last week. We stayed with Cromwell for 98 percent of the game, but we had as many as eight catastrophic breakdowns that resulted in touchdowns or really long plays,” Gerzin said. “They had some big scoring plays and two long punt returns to set them up to score again. Oher than that, I thought we were right there in the game. We have to make sure our mistakes aren’t that costly.”
Junior running back Jason Kerntz missed another game due to a knee injury, but Gerzin anticipates he will be on the field for Ely’s Homecoming game against Cook County.
The Timberwolves have an open week next week that would have been a game at Northeast Range. They close out the regular season on Wednesday, Oct. 20 with a 6 p.m. game at Littlefork.