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Gladbrook-Reinbeck used big plays to outrun a bruising Clarksville team, 56-20, at Gladbrook on Oct. 10.

The Rebels, ranked third in 8-man, improved to 7-0 overall and clinched the District 6 title with one game left to play at North Tama in the regular-season finale.
Hudson Clark accounted for five total touchdowns for the Rebels, including two receiving touchdowns, a rushing touchdown and both a kickoff and punt return for a touchdown.

Clark is now the third player in 8-man history to return at least eight kickoffs for touchdowns in a career, joining Meskwaki’s Terrell Grant (9) and Seymour’s Ethan Miller. Earlier this season, Clark tied Murray’s Andrew Rider for the most career interceptions in 8-man with his sixth pick-six.

“It’s like backyard football with your brothers, they throw the ball up and you have to run away from them,” Clark said. “I had quite a few brothers that were able to tackle me growing up, but you just have to run away, follow your blocks and trust your gut, and we’ve got great guys blocking up front.”

Clarksville had the early advantage, taking the opening kick and scoring on a solid opening drive capped by a 1-yard touchdown run from Nathan Moon, the Indian quarterback who carried the ball 32 times for two scores in the first half.

“We just had to step down, drop our shoulders,” Trevyon Herron said. “And I had to make an adjustment, too, I was kind of rushing things, I just gotta play patient, trust my guys up front to open a gap and let me fill in and just help.”

The Rebels responded to the first score two plays later with a Treyvon Herron touchdown run and Clark added his punt return for a touchdown to make it 13-8 G-R after one quarter. Clarksville had a 14-13 lead after Moon’s second touchdown run, but Clark returned the ensuing kickoff for a score and a Karson Van Heiden interception on Clarksville’s next drive set up a Clark touchdown reception to make it 27-14 G-R midway through the second quarter. Herron added a 3-yard touchdown run and the Rebels never looked back, leading 35-14 at halftime.

“It really comes down to our depth,” G-R head coach John Olson said. “We’ve got 32 kids out for football and our scout team is really, really good. Dreyson Morgan and Joe Wolf are two seniors on our team that don’t get a lot of playing time when it’s game time, but they’re playing center and quarterback for our scout team and getting pounded on in practice. It gets nasty when we’re running power 15 straight times against our starting defense, but we can do that because we’ve had seniors doing it for four years.

“Their [Clarksville’s] mentality was three yards and a cloud of dust and that’s OK for them, but we have to have that mentality where we weren’t OK with just three yards. … At some point in time, our guys are pretty talented guys, and they work really hard like Clarksville does, and we were able to exploit what we could do against them.”

Trevor Mathern completed all seven of his passes for 73 yards and three touchdowns, including one for Kael Blohm. Herron finished with 10 rushes for 116 yards and two scores after scoring seven touchdowns on over 300 yards rushing against Collins-Maxwell in Week 6.

“He’s a more physical player than last year,” Olson said of Herron. “He was very fast last year and he could stiff-arm people, but this year he wants to bring contact down, low to the ground, so people are bouncing off, and his feet never stop moving.

“Then you’ve got four guys like Wyatt Giesking, Garrett Gebel, Gavin Blakesley and Cole Gramer up front, there’s holes for Treyvon, there’s holes for Hudson, they’re doing an amazing job up front getting things done.”

It’s another district title under Gladbrook-Reinbeck’s belts, which isn’t something to take for granted, Clark said.

“Something Olson’s always beating into us is that winning is hard, and that’s why it feels so good to win these games,” Clark added. “Last regular-season game here at The Pit, so it’s a special game, and to win the district, that’s pretty sweet, too.”

GRUNDY CENTER 55, CENTRAL SPRINGS 0: The Spartans won their 46th game in a row as part of a long road trip to Manly on Oct. 10.
The Spartans outgained the Panthers in total yards, 415-142, and scored on eight of their 10 possessions to mathematically secure the Class 1A District 3 title.
Grundy Center quarterback Judd Jirovsky completed 8 of 11 passes for 189 yards and three touchdowns; both of Ethan Meester’s catches on Friday were touchdowns for a total of 70 yards and Eli Wegmann added a 16-yard touchdown reception with three total grabs for 57 yards.
Cooper Keller led the Grundy Center running game with 13 totes for 73 yards and two scores; Jirovsky, Hayden Geerdes and Pete Lebo all had one touchdown each on the ground for the Spartans.
The Spartans also forced four turnovers, with an interception each for Wegmann and Aiden Betts, Brannen Jensen and Reid Beenken had one fumble recovery a piece.
Grundy Center led 42-0 at halftime. The Spartans, ranked second in Class 1A, return home to take on Eagle Grove in the regular-season finale on Friday, Oct. 17.

DIKE-NEW HARTFORD 27, VINTON-SHELLSBURG 15: The Wolverine rushing attack set the pace against the Vikings for D-NH’s senior night in Dike on Oct. 10.
D-NH finished with 239 total rushing yards, averaging nearly six yards a carry with Devlin Davis leading the way at 24 carries for 148 yards. Peyton Pokorny completed 11 of 18 passes for 100 yards with a touchdown and two interceptions; Tate Block had the touchdown reception and was one of eight Wolverines with at least one reception on Friday.
The Wolverine defense also forced four Vinton-Shellsburg turnovers, converting two of them for touchdowns as Dawson Dietrick returned an interception for a score and Levi Folkerts ran in a fumble recovery for a touchdown. Aiden Walston and Jacob Feaker added an interception each.
D-NH had 11 team tackles for loss, including 2 ½ each for Logan Hayes and Lane Girsch. Davis led the Wolverines with 10 total stops, including two for a loss.
The Wolverines are 5-2 overall and 3-1 in Class 2A District 4 play and wrap up the season at Hampton-Dumont-CAL on Friday.