Panthers Too Much For Warriors In Sectional LossNAPPANEE – The NorthWood Panthers, behind the arms and legs of junior quarterback Nate Newcomer, ended the visiting Wawasee Warriors season with a 49-3 defeat in a Class 4A sectional football game.
Despite the score, those in attendance were witness to a few takeaways. The most notable was “Warrior Grit”.
It’s the mantra coach Jon Reutebuch, his coaching staff, and his athletes embraced for a program that endured injuries and the use of younger players sooner than expected without making excuses for their 2-8 final won-loss record
“They played hard. ‘Warrior Grit’ will be a continued process. It’s going to take some time,” Reutebuch said. “I just talked to the seniors. I feel for them because they’ve had three head coaches in four years.
“We are going to get better week-to-week and year-to-year. We’ve made some great strides but we’re not there yet.”
The Warriors (2-8) didn’t lose their level of energy throughout the game. They also didn’t have any turnovers. NorthWood had an efficient running attack and defensively, they had the right recipe to keep Warrior QB Parker Young and receivers Ethan Garza and Kam Salazar from getting behind them. The Warriors struggled on their first four series against the Panther defensive backfield.
Wawasee put together a 13-play 45-yard drive after they found themselves down 28-0 late in the second quarter. Warrior grit was getting them past the obstacles the NorthWood defense had in place. Young completed 7 of his 10 passes exploiting the open flat with bubble screens to put speedsters Salazar and Garza in open space. The drive set up kicker Evan Dippon for a 34-yard field goal to end the first half. The Warriors went to their locker room trailing 28-3.
Momentum swung back toward NorthWood, who used big plays and two long passes to Jason Burkholder to put the game away. One was a 49-yard touchdown, and another was a 16-yard strike that set up Veshon Malone’s one-yard touchdown run resulting in a NorthWood 42-3 lead, and a mercy-rule running clock thereafter. Each team began substituting throughout the fourth quarter before the 49-3 final score.
“That’s a good NorthWood team, and we made too many mistakes,” Reutebuch said. “When you make mistakes, they kind of compound. We kind of dug ourselves into a hole. There were plays out there to be made. Seems like we would have something positive happen then we’d have a flag or a bad snap on a punt.”
Newcomer accounted for 167 yards rushing, most of it on an 80-yard TD run in the second quarter to go along with 94 yards passing on five of seven completed attempts. Parker Young was 11-22 for 59 yards, and Jordan Grindle added a pass off a fake punt to Gabe Moore for 31 yards. The Warriors faced a tough Panther defensive front seven who only gave up 31 rushing yards.
Reutebuch reiterated one takeaway from this season’s rebuilding progress.
“We can also learn some life lessons through football,” he said. “‘Warrior Grit’ is going to get them through hard times later in life.”
