FORKS — Neah Bay went up 16-0 before Winlock touched the ball offensively as the Red Devils overwhelmed the Cardinals 56-6 in a Class 1B Quad District playoff game Friday night at Spartan Stadium.
The win sealed the Red Devils return to the eight-man football state tournament.
Neah Bay (9-0) will learn its state tournament path sometime Sunday after the WIAA playoff seeding committee seeds the bracket. The Red Devils are virtually assured of a top seed in the 12-team tournament and a first-round bye.
“We started out really fast and scored on our first four drives,” coach Kane Bachelor said.
“If we could bottle that first quarter up and have that be our consistent product we’d be set.”
Jodell Wimberly rumbled 22 times for 254 yards and three touchdowns for the Red Devils while quarterback Julian Carrick added nine runs for 114 yards, three touchdowns and a 60-yard touchdown pass to Tyler Swan.
Bachelor had praise for Swan’s play.
“A freshman who plays guard, fullback and linebacker and doesn’t touch the ball for us that often, but he played every single down for us, had six tackles, two for loss, a fumble recovery and the TD catch. He was everywhere.”
Defensive linemen Andre Greene and Kaeden Butterfield combined for seven tackles for loss for Neah Bay.
“Both are seniors and have been in the weight room for five years and are really good at using their hands to get off blocks and make a play,” Bachelor said.
Port Angeles 28, Chief Sealth 14
SEATTLE — The Roughriders clipped the Seahawks in their nonleague season finale with strong performances defensively, on special teams and in the run game offensively Friday at Seattle’s Southwest Athletic Complex.
“We’ve been playing really well defensively to close out the season and we kept that up last night,” coach Dustin Clark said.
“From start to finish I felt we dominated the game and the line of scrimmage. Tucker Rygaard, Tom Moran, Tanner Flores and Conner Martin, our front four defensively — Chief Sealth wanted to run outside and they had a good running back, but they couldn’t do anything. It was fun to see those guys connect and [linebackers ]Jason Hawes and Landyn Jones chase down everything.
Port Angeles’ Tom Moran blocked a punt on Chief Sealth’s first offensive drive and Kason Albaugh scooped and scored from about 20 yards out to put the Riders up early, the first of three first-half touchdowns for Albaugh.
Another Port Angeles defensive stop led to a second Riders’ score.
“With the wind blowing as hard as it was, throwing the ball was not a big option, so we did what we planned to do and Kason [Albaugh], Jason [Hawes] and Landyn [Jones] had big nights running the ball.”
Albaugh did much of the work on the TD drive with a little help from Hawes and scored again from inside the 5-yard line early in the second quarter.
Albaugh added a short rushing score before the break and the Riders led 21-0 at half.
With the wind increasing after halftime, Jones busted loose late in the third quarter, getting to the edge for a 40-yard rushing touchdown and a 28-0 advantage.
Port Angeles yielded a couple of late scores while substituting players off the sideline.
Hawes and James Browning intercepted passes for the Riders, who finished the season at 4-6 overall.
“This season has had some ups and downs, starting off strong with a good win, then we played four really tough games in a row — a couple of top-10 teams, then our rival then another top-10 team in Olympic,” Clark said. “Losing [starting QB/Safety] Parker Nickerson put our guys in a tough spot, we had to make some changes and figure out what we needed to fix and we did a good job of that defensively. And when Parker came back our guys responded to his leadership as well.”
Granite Falls 25, East Jefferson 6
GRANITE FALLS — The Rivals wrapped their season with a road loss on the Tigers’ turf.
