Here’s how Prairie, after dropping two straight at home, can win football games:

Make sure senior speed demon and escape artist Jalen Rima gets the pigskin.

In Prairie's 42-28 second-half shootout loss to Dubuque Senior on Friday night, Rima touched the ball 11 times and accounted for 249 yards. He had five pass receptions for 116 yards, three carries for 50 yards and three kickoff returns for 83 more.

The state champion 400-meter sprinter also scored two of Prairie’s four touchdowns.

"He’s a big-time player, a big-time athlete,” said Prairie quarterback Tyler Nunemaker. “Every time he gets the ball, he comes up big.”

But scoring points doesn’t seem to be the Hawks’ problem after starting the season with a win over Linn-Mar before losing last week to Jefferson. They’ve averaged 32 points a game.

Unfortunately, they’ve also allowed an average of 38 points a game.

"You’d think that 28 points sould be enough to win a game,” Nunemaker pointed out.

And he was quick to blame himself for giving up the ball at a really crucial juncture Friday night in the fourth quarter.

The two teams sort of felt each out in the first half, a slow-paced 24 minutes that produced a 7-7 tie. Fireworks began soon after, however, when the Rams’ Collin Seymour ran the second-half kickoff back 83 yards for a score.

But then Rima, who himself had opened the game with a 28-yard return, ran the next return back 37 yards and a few plays later peeled around left end untouched for a 27-yard touchdown. He scored again later in the third quarter after taking a pass from Nunemaker and squirting 48 yards to paydirt.

On the other side, though, Senior quarterback Lee Bonifas scored twice himself on short keepers and passed for another. Dubuque Senior (2-1) led 35-28 when Nunemaker tried to rally his team back with 4:45 left in the game.

A 3-yard run by Rima was followed by two dropped passes to other receivers, leaving the Hawks in desperate straits on their own 38.

"We like to get Rima the ball, and that’s what we tried to do,” Nunemaker explained.

Unfortunately, he pegged a slant pass right into the arms of Ram defender Seymour, who took it back 46 yards for his second long touchdown of the night.

“The kid made a good play,” Nunemaker allowed. “He jumped right into the route.

“We needed a first down, but I never should have thrown that ball. That cost us momentum.”

The gritty senior quarterback was knocked silly when sacked on the next series. His replacement Dakota Simonsen immediately tossed an interception of his own and the game was pretty much over.

The Hawks will have a good chance to redeem themselves next week, though, when they travel to North Scott to face a struggling team that got whacked 42-0 by Kennedy on Friday night.

DUBUQUE SENIOR 42, PRAIRIE 28

.                            DS       CRP

First downs             18          19

Rushes-yards     39-262    47-237

Passing yards         165         137

Comp-att-int     10-16-0     7-17-2

Fumbles-lost            1-1         1-1

Punts-avg              3-43       4-36

Penalties-yards       4-35       3-30

Dubuque Senior   0  7 21 14 - 42

Prairie                  7  0 14   7 - 28

Scoring plays

P – Northrup 34 run (Collett kick)

D – Bonifas 14 run (Kubitz kick)

D – Seymour 83 kickoff return (Kubitz kick)

P – Rima 27 run (kick failed)

D – Bonifas 3 run (Kubitz kick)

P - Rima 48 pass from Nunemaker (Johnson run)

D – Osterkamp 63 pass from Bonifas (Kubitz kick)

P – Northrup 21 run (Collett kick)

D – Bonifas 1 run (kubitz kick)

D – Seymour 46 interception return (Kubitz kick)

Individual statistics

Rushing

Dubuque Senior – Osterberger 24-127, Bonifas 10-55, Schnee 10-68.

Prairie – Northrup 13-81, Rima 3-50, Johnson 7-49, Pinter 2-20, Nunemaker 13-64.

Passing

Dubuque Senior - Bonifas 10-16-0, 165.

Prairie -- Nunemaker 7-16-1, 137; Simonsen 0-1-0-1.

Receiving

Dubuque Senior – Osterkamp 2-30, Sweeney 3-89.

Prairie – Rima 5-116, Johnson 2-32, Meyer 1-19.

 

 

 

 

 

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