Wolves victimize Vikings

Chad Fowler knew he was going to get a lot of touches Friday night.

And the South Kitsap running back made the most of all of them, from the first one, which turned into an 80-yard flea flicker to the final one, which went for a 14-yard touchdown and all the ones in between, helping the Wolves to a 41-12 Narrows League Bridge Division win over North Kitsap.

Fowler, a junior who entered August practices as the sixth running back on the depth chart, rushed for 252 yards and scored four times as South Kitsap moved to 3-2 overall and 3-0 in league play.

The Vikings, who had beaten South 62-7 last year, dropped to 2-3 and 1-2.

“We pounded them, and we’re going to keep pounding them,” Fowler said. “We’re going to pound anyone that gets in our way.”

Fowler did plenty of that, leading an offense that rolled up 540 yards, 424 coming on the ground behind a dominating performance by the horses up front.

“Most of the time, it was pretty basic,” said center Andrew Thatcher. “Just going forward. We figured out that we could just run on them all the time. I think we called the same play maybe 75 percent of the time.”

That play usually included a handoff to Fowler, who carried 30 times and scored on runs of 9, 22, 9 and 14 yards.

“I felt we were getting stronger as a team,” Fowler said. “Defense started clicking, the offense started clicking and we just kept rolling on from there.”

Fowler got things started by taking the opening handoff and pitching it back to quarterback Kyle Pease, who then hit a wide open Monte Enyeart for an 80-yard touchdown. That set a tempo the Wolves followed by pounding the ball inside play after play after play.

“I’d hand the ball off and there’d be a hole a truck could drive through,” Pease said. “It was really nice to see that. We figured our line could pretty much dominated their line.”

And that was the key factor in the game, North coach Steve Frease said.

“This game is won or lost on the line most of the time, and their line guys out-muscled our line guys,” Frease said. “The back ran really hard; it was pretty typical South Kitsap.

“I thought we really had a chance going in at halftime,” Frease added. “I think their adjustments were better than ours at the half, and their kids worked harder in the weight room and it becomes evident. But I don’t discredit our kids, they played their guts out.”

Down 13-0 in the second quarter, the Vikings put together a seven-play drive that covered 64 yards and ended with James Smith scoring from a couple yards out.

After South scored to make it 20-6, North answered right back as James Smith caught a 20-yard TD pass from Paul Stock with 10 seconds left in the half to cut the score to 20-12.

But North would get no closer as Fowler, continued to pound away at the defense.

“We wanted to let the O-line get their feet under them, get some confidence and get that developed,” Sigurdson said. “They did a really nice job. The line really blocked well. They were physical. I was very happy with the way they played.”

Pease, who had been carrying the load through the first four games, attempted just five passes against the Vikings, completing three for 116 yards.

And while the offense was only stopped by its own mistakes, the Wolves committed three turnovers, the defense kept the Vikings in check, allowing 188 total yards, 82 of those coming on the ground.

James Smith led the Vikings with 36 yards on nine tries while Stock completed 6 of 15 passes for 106 yards.

South, tied for first place in league play with Gig Harbor, plays host to Olympic on Friday night, while North travels down to Central Kitsap in a key game that could decide the third and final team out of the league to advance to the postseason.

South Kitsap 41, North Kitsap 12

Score by quarters

South Kitsap 7 13 7 14 - 41

North Kitsap 0 12 0 0 - 12

Scoring summary

SK - Monte Enyeart 80 pass from Kyle Pease (Quincy Lyman kick)

SK - Chad Fowler 9 run (Kick failed)

NK - James Smith 2 run (Kick failed)

SK - Fowler 22 run (Lyman kick)

NK – James Smith 20 pass from Paul Stock (Kick failed)

SK - Fowler 9 run (Lyman kick)

SK - Fowler 14 run (Lyman kick)

SK - Stephan Tucker 8 run (Lyman kick)

South Kitsap North Kitsap

First Downs 21 11

Rushes-yards 53-424 28-82

Passing yards 116 106

Return yards 18 56

Passes (C-A-I) 3-5-0 6-15-0

Punts 0-0 6-31.8

Fumbles-Lost 4-3 2-0

Penalties-yards 5-45 2-20

Individual statistics

Rushing: South Kitsap - Chad Fowler 30-252, 4 TDs; Kyle Pease 4-12; Cory Dame 5-19; Cedric Carter 1-57; Stephan Tucker 9-45, TD; Anthony Catalano 4-39. North Kitsap - Jerrell Smith 9-36; Paul Stock 6-4; Jamaal Smith 4-(-4); Greg Ottele 3-16; James Smith 1-2, TD; Jeff Ottele 3-6; Stephan Jones 2-22.

Passing: South Kitsap - Pease 3-5-0, 116 yards, TD. North Kitsap - Stock 6-15-0, 106 yards, TD.

Receiving: South Kitsap - Enyeart 1-80, TD; Jesse Galligan 1-19; Jason Read 1-17. North Kitsap - Brian Cleaver 2-11; James Smith 2-74, TD; Jeff Ottele 1-8; Stephan Jones 1-13.

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