Photo Courtesy of Mid-Prairie Football Social Media

Show Up. Dominate. Go Home. It was all business for the Mid-Prairie Golden Hawk football team Friday night at Ike Ryan Field in Eddyville as the Hawks opened Class 2A District Six by rolling the EBF Rockets 56-0. Before fans could settle into their seats, Mid-Prairie had found the end zone not once, but twice in the game’s first 90 seconds. After opening the night with a 50 yard completion from Collin Miller to Grady Gingerich, Braden Hartley had the first of his five touchdown runs, a 14 yard untouched trot into the end zone to make it 7-0. On the Rockets first offensive play, Grady Miller recovered a fumble for the Hawks, one of six Mid-Prairie takeaways on the night, and the very next play it was Hartley into the end zone again, this time for 21 yards. First play, next Rocket trip with the ball, Russell McCrea found the Mid-Prairie secondary with Lukin Rediger recording the first pick of his Golden Hawk career. Mid-Prairie would cash that in for points as well, seven plays later, Hartley completed his hat trick of touchdowns with an eight yarder to put the Golden Hawks up 21-0.

Things continued to snowball from there. Mid-Prairie would lead 42-0 after just one period with Hartley finding the end zone again to put the Hawks up 28-0. His four consecutive scoring runs were followed by a Jarron Thomas rushing score and a Collin Miller pick six. In the second quarter, Landon Sullivan added a 32-yard scoring run to make it 49-0 MP at the break. Out of half, Hartley added a final touchdown run to give him five on the night, the last, a nine yarder. In a game full of bright spots, Mid-Prairie head coach Pete Cavanagh joined the KCII postgame show to talk about his biggest takeaways. “We got off to a good start. We turned them over early. Collin Miller hit a play action pass to Grady Gingerich on the first play. We played well up front on the line on both sides of the ball and Braden (Hartley) ran well behind them. Once the momentum started turning it was tough for them (EBF). I wanted to get some guys in and see what they could do. Get some different looks. Mix up our offense a little bit. We didn’t get a lot of opportunities because we were able to break some. We need to make sure that we are getting better every week in district play.”

Unofficially, the Hawks outgained the Rockets 335 to 106 in total yards, including 250 to 94 on the ground. Mid-Prairie forced six takeaways including four interceptions, one each for Lukin Rediger, Collin Miller, Cobi Hershberger and Ace Peck, while allowing just one completion for 12 yards. Terry Bordenave and Grady Miller each had a fumble recovery. Braden Hartley went for 176 yards and five scores on 15 carries. Collin Miller threw for 85 yards and added a defensive touchdown with Sullivan and Thomas also scoring TDs. Mid-Prairie has now won 12 of the 13 all-time meetings between the two schools by a combined 570-84 score including 215-7 in the last four meetings. The Hawks are now 3-1 on the year and 1-0 in district as they return home next week to meet Central Lee. EBF falls to 0-4.