PORT ORCHARD — There was just one thing running through the minds of the North Kitsap football team Friday night: “Remember the pain you felt last year and use that to work harder tonight.”
Boy, did they ever.
Recalling last year’s 39-35 home loss to South Kitsap, the Vikings put on an offensive show at Joe Knowles Field in Port Orchard, scoring on every possession of the first half en route to a convincing 62-7 Narrows League Bridge Division win over the Wolves. North’s win was the first over South since 1977.
“The atmosphere around the locker room and before the game on the bus was completely different from any game we’ve played so far,” said junior receiver Jordan Henry. “You could tell that everyone came to play tonight.”
And play well ,as the Vikings needed just 20 offensive plays to score seven first-half touchdowns. Three of those scores came on one-play drives.
“The kids, I thought, played really, really well,” said North coach Jerry Parrish. “It’s been a long time in coming. I think our kids came out ready to play and they played really hard. I was very proud of them.”
The Vikings, now 3-2 overall and 2-1 in league play, fed off of last year’s bitter loss that ultimately led to the team’s bowing out of the playoff race. During the week leading up to the game, the team was asked to list its goals for the South game and using last year’s loss as a motivator topped the list.
But did it make a difference?
“Oh, quite a bit, quite a bit, quite a bit,” Parrish said. “The other thing is we could have scored more but that’s not the point. The point being that everyone got to play and some of them played better than others but we’re getting better.”
It was obvious the game would belong to the Vikings as they scored the first time they touched the ball. North’s first snap from scrimmage resulted in a 14-yard scoring run by senior running back Jeff Camus.
A few minutes later, Andy Sturza scored from 12 yards out and the rout was on.
The Vikings then scored four times in the next six minutes on their way to a 49-0 halftime lead, making it look easy. Sometimes, too easy.
“After awhile, when you start moving the ball at will, you kind of get that feeling,” said senior quarterback Jared Prince. “And we definitely got that feeling. We came out fired up to play, we were so excited to play this game, I had a rough time sleeping all week.”
It didn’t show on the field. For the game, Prince completed eight-of-11 passes for 229 yards and four touchdowns and also took one in himself from three yards out.
“That was not expected at all,” Parrish said of the ease with which his team scored. “But I’ll say this — our quarterback is pretty good.”
And so is the rest of his offense.
Henry caught three passes for 155 yards and two touchdowns, those coming on plays that covered 65 and 78 yards. Sturza rushed for 44 yards on five carries while Camus picked up 104 yards on eight tries.
In all, the Vikings rushed for 245 yards and threw for 230 and scored nine times.
“We knew we were going to come out ready to play,” Prince said. “And give it to them.”
The Wolves, now 1-4 overall and 1-2 in league play, have given up at least 47 points in all four of its losses and can’t seem to stop anyone on defense.
“I don’t know what to say,” said South coach D.J. Sigurdson. “I kind of said it all last week. It wasn’t too much different of an outcome than we had last week (a 47-18 loss to Shelton). But we’re not giving up.”
Offensively, South turned the ball over three times while picking up 235 yards of offense, 208 of that coming on the ground.
Senior tailback Anthony Galloway carried the load once again, grinding out 99 tough yards on 26 carries. The Wolves’ Brandon Kelly scored on a 2-yard run with less than three minutes remaining in the game to deny North the shutout.
“I think this is a big win for our kids mentally,” Parrish said. “And physically, I don’t think we got anyone hurt and we’re going to be better as we go.”
The win keeps the Vikings playoff hopes alive while South is all but out of the race and could miss the postseason for the second year in a row after making the state playoffs a record 23-straight years.
South travels to Olympic Friday while North plays host to Central Kitsap.
“We had a nice, big pregame talk about how we’ve taken our previous games and we haven’t really taken them as serious as we took the one today,” Henry said. “It was a big win for us.”
North Kitsap 62, South Kitsap 7
North Kitsap 21 21 6 7 — 62
South Kitsap 0 0 0 7 — 7
Scoring Summary
NK – Jeff Camus 14 run (kick blocked)
NK – Andy Sturza 12 run (Sturza run)
NK – Henry 65 pass from Jared Prince (Jeff Ottele kick)
NK – Prince 3 run (Ottele kick)
NK – Travis Tobin 33 pass from Prince (Ottele kick)
NK – Camus 5 pass from Prince (Ottele kick)
NK – Henry 78 pass from Prince (Ottele kick)
NK – Sturza 2 run (pass failed)
NK – Jerrell Smith 5 run (Ottele kick)
SK – Brandon Kelly 2 run (Cory Dame kick)
North Kitsap South Kitsap
22 First Downs 8
39-245 Rushes/Yards 40-208
229 Passing yards 27
8-11-0 Passes 5-12-3
3-1 Fumbles/Lost 3-2
2-15 Penalties 6-47
Individual statistics
Rushing: North Kitsap – Andy Sturza 5-44, TD; Jeff Camus 8-104, TD; Jordan Henry 1-12, TD; Travis Tobin 2-22; Jared Prince 1-3, TD; Ray Spears 1-4; Jerrell Smith 14-50, TD; Garren Dukes 1-3; Ray Quitano 2-5; Paul Stock 2-(-2). South Kitsap – Anthony Galloway 26-99; Orry Perez 10-45; Jeff Coulon 1-1; David Hammrich 2- (-4); Brandon Kelly 1-2, TD.
Passing: North Kitsap – Jared Prince 8-11-0, 230 yards, 4TDs. South Kitsap – Kyle Pease 3-9-2, 23 yards; David Hammrich 2-3-1, 4 yards.
Receiving: North Kitsap – Travis Tobin 3-56, TD; Jordan Henry 3-155, 2TD; Jeff Camus 2-18, TD. South Kitsap – Jeff Coulon 1-6; Tom Cornell 2-16; Anthony Galloway 1-(-3); Kyle Vetter 1-8.
