Wawasee High School's football team dominated one of four quarters Friday night at Fisher Field in Warsaw. The problem was, the host Tigers dominated the other three.
Falling behind 21-0 in the opening quarter, Wawasee responded with 21-unanswered points in the second quarter. However, from there, it was all Warsaw, as the home team outscored the Warriors 36-6 in the second half, resulting in the 57-27 Northern Lakes Conference win."We just had a little talk at halftime about what caused our problems, where we're at and what we need to do in the second half to rectify them," Warsaw coach Phil Jensen said about his team, which had its biggest scoring output since a 62-0 sectional win over Kokomo on Oct. 19, 2001. "Boy, they did it."
After watching Wawasee (2-5, 0-5 NLC) tally 143 total yards and three touchdowns in the second quarter, the Tigers' (3-4, 2-3 NLC) defense limited the Warriors to 12 second-half yards.
"I don't care what kind of adjustment you make, it shouldn't be good enough that we can't make a first down, and our defense, just all of a sudden, fell apart," Wawasee coach Tom Wogomon said. "I hate to see what the second-half totals are."
He certainly will.
Making the offensive numbers even more difficult to swallow is the 254 yards his defense gave up in the final 24 minutes. And all those yards came on the ground.
"The offensive line did a better job of handling their blitz," Jensen said. "Andy (Conrad) and Justin (Clemens) both ran really hard."
Conrad finished the game with 181 yards and two touchdowns, while Clemens also ran for two scores.
The victory leaves the 'W' Trophy, established by the Robert Reiff family in 1986, in possession of the Tigers for the third-straight season.
"It wasn't pretty, but it was a big win for our seniors," Jensen said. "They get to keep the trophy. It means a lot to them, it means a lot to the community and it means a lot to the coaches. It's a great thing. My hat's off to the Reiff family for starting this whole thing."
In the first 12 minutes, it appeared Warsaw would have no problem getting the win.
Clemens' first touchdown came on Warsaw's opening drive of the game, and Tom Daniels increased the lead later in the quarter when he returned a punt 83 yards for a touchdown.
The lead increased to 21-0 after Wawasee quarterback Jake Sommers was blindsided by a blitzing Daniels with just over a minute to play. The hit caused the ball to pop loose, and Warsaw's Brandon Head was there to scoop it up and return it 47 yards for the score, giving the Tigers a comfortable lead.
"That was a great call on their part," Wogomon said about the Tigers' blitz on the play.
When it seemed like the Tigers would be able to run away with it, the Wawasee offense picked it up, beginning with a 28-yard touchdown run by Andrew Hepler with 9:50 remaining in the second quarter.
After the Wawasee defense forced a three-and-out, the Warriors' offense needed just one play to get into the end zone, this time it was Sommers finding a wide open Jordan Schmitt in the flat for a 46-yard catch-and-run score, cutting the deficit to 21-14.
Wawasee regained possession of the ball three minutes later, recovering a Warsaw fumble at the Tigers' 37-yard line.
Starting with good field position, Wawasee drove the ball down the field and capped the drive off with a five-yard touchdown pass from Sommers to Ryan Hoover. Following the extra point by Kyle Clevenger, Wawasee had tied the game with 2:56 remaining in the half.
"Unfortunately again tonight, we showed our lack of mental intensity at times," Jensen said. "Hats off to Wawasee. They could have quit, but they didn't. They came out and made plays that just had us befuddled in every which way in that second quarter."
Things began to clear up for Warsaw in the second half, with their opening drive ending in a 43-yard field goal by Matt Franco, grabbing the lead back at 24-21.
The field goal must have re-awakened the Warsaw offense, as it went on to score a touchdown on each of its next five possessions, beginning with a 10-yard scamper by Conrad with 2:47 left in the third quarter and ending with a 74-yard run by backup quarterback Jeremy Coppes with just 45 seconds remaining in the game.
Wawasee's lone highlight in the second half came when Tom Kehoe returned a kickoff 93 yards for a score, cutting the Tigers' lead to 37-27 late in the third quarter.
"When Tom took the kickoff return back I thought we were going to have a little fight again," Wogomon said. "We're just too much of a team that is up and down as the ebb goes. We can not find that consistent way to play football."
The loss is Wawasee's fifth-straight, while the win is Warsaw's second in a row after the Tigers snapped their own four-game skid last week at Goshen.
"They can get a lot better," Jensen said about his team. "They just have to approach each practice and each thing they do with the same mental intensity and focus they approached the second half with."
Warsaw's next shot to show they've gotten better is Friday at home against NorthWood. Wawasee will look to get it first conference win at home against Elkhart Memorial Friday.
