Photo Courtesy of Mid-Prairie Football Social Media
The Mid-Prairie Golden Hawk football team takes the field in the playoffs Friday with revenge on their mind when they travel to Williamsburg to face the No. 1 ranked Raiders in the second round of the 2A postseason. Mid-Prairie is 6-3 coming into the night after a 7-6 win in the opening round at Northeast Goose Lake a week ago. The Hawks beat the Rebels on a Braden Hartley fourth quarter touchdown run and Cain Brown extra point. Mid-Prairie outgained the Rebels 303 to 184 in total yards, including 256 to 105 on the ground in the win. Hartley finished with 40 carries for 163 yards, a touchdown, and six tackles. Collin Miller was five of 11 through the air for 47 yards and had another 80 yards rushing. Dylan Henry caught two passes for 22 yards. Mid-Prairie scores 26 points per game and gives up 19. The Golden Hawk offense averages 303 yards per game, 217 rushing. Individual leaders include Hartley with 216 carries, 1,335 yards and 14 touchdowns on the ground. Through the air, Miller is 42 of 102 for 670 yards, eight touchdowns and eight interceptions. Brown has caught 23 balls for 417 yards and five touchdowns. He also leads the defense with four interceptions and 48 tackles.
Williamsburg is unbeaten at 9-0 this season after 42-0 win over Camanche last week in their playoff opener. The Raiders are ranked No. 1 in Class 2A according to the final poll issued by the Iowa Associated Press and were champions of Class 2A District 6 in the regular season. The Raiders score 51 points a night and give up 10. They average 340 yards per contest, with 194 coming on the ground. Individual leaders include Carson Huedepohl with 1,531 all-purpose yards including 1,087 passing on 73 of 127 for 15 touchdowns and five interceptions. His top target is Derek Weisskopf with 26 catches for 411 yards and eight touchdowns. Gable Dayton is the leading ground gainer at 573 yards on 73 carries with eight touchdowns. Rayce Heitman has 63 and a half tackles on defense. This week, Mid-Prairie head coach Pete Cavanagh talked about the earlier matchup with the Raiders, how the teams have changed and his keys. “When you’re as close in proximity as we are, and you play so often, you become really familiar with what they do, and they’re familiar with what we do. So then it comes down to executing and making plays. They’re a very good team. We need to put it all together. When we played earlier, we put them into third and long a couple of times, we got after their quarterback, created a turnover. Offensively, we were able to run the ball at times. It’s hard to understand how good their defense is or how fast they are until you see them in person. We’re playing with a little bit more confidence and we know who we are. We can’t turn the ball over and we have to move the chains. We have players that can make plays. We have to go out there, roll the dice, and get after it.”
The Hawks and Raiders met on the Hawk’s Homecoming in Wellman September 30th with Williamsburg taking a 56-7 win. That’s the ninth straight victory for the Raiders in the series dating back to 2009. The winner of this contest advances to next week’s 2A quarterfinals. You can hear all of the action live tonight between the Golden Hawks and Raiders on AM 1380 and FM 102.5 KCII, beginning with the Washington HyVee Pregame Show at 6:30p.m. and kickoff at 7 from Bob Murphy Stadium.