By Fred Kroner
The pain from injuries was not what was on the mind of St. Joseph-Ogden football coach following a 50-7 loss to Tolono Unity on Friday (Sept. 2) in the Spartans’ home-opener.
“The biggest thing that hurts,” Skinner said, “is our pride.”
SJ-O was coming off a Week 1 win. Unity was coming off a Week 1 loss.
“Unity didn’t have a good first week and was Uber-focused,” Skinner said. “Our kids learned to be humble and to prepare the same each week.
“This is part of learning how to compete week in and week out at the varsity level. We woke some people up (with a first-game win at Monticello) and got their attention.”
Skinner hopes he now has his players’ full attention, though he acknowledged, “on film, it was not quite as bad as in real time.”
Unity led 21-0 after one quarter and expanded its lead to 28-0 before Logan Smith connected on a 10-yard scoring strike to Ty Pence.
Joe Frasca’s conversion kick cut the Spartans’ deficit to 28-7.
Smith completed 8 of 17 passes for 57 yards. Carson Sarnecki had four receptions and Pence caught three passes.
“Logan in his second (varsity) game, didn’t back down from anything he saw,” Skinner said.
Defensively, two Spartans fared well, lineman Owen Birt and cornerback Rowan Musselman.
“Musselman had a tremendous game,” Skinner said. “His mental game was on point.”
SJ-O (1-1) returns to action on Friday (Sept. 9) at Prairie Central (2-0), which knocked off Unity in the season-opener for each school.
“We need to lick our wounds and see how we respond,” Skinner said. “We have to eat some humble pie and realize there is a lot of work to do. We have to get right back at it.”
