Cedar Rapids Prairie beats Iowa City West up front to close the regular season with a 28-21 win

CEDAR RAPIDS — Roby Swartzendruber sat on a sideline table during warmups, his left knee propped up and the school’s trainer poking and prodding at it.

Never a good sign.

“A bunch of scar tissue popped,” the Cedar Rapids Prairie offensive tackle said.

Swartzendruber blew out that knee exactly a year ago in a game against Iowa City West, the Hawks’ opponent Friday night. He worked through nine months of rehab after surgery to be able to get back and play football his senior season, only to appear to re-injure that knee as he and his team prepared to play West again.

What an incredible bummer.

“It popped, and the trainer said it was going to hurt more,” Swartzendruber said. “But it wasn’t going to damage anything anymore. So I just had to fight through it. Then one play early, it popped back, and it was fine.”

More than fine, exceptional, as were the rest of his fellow linemen. All the Hawks, actually.

Prairie rushed for 327 yards to beat West, 28-21, in the regular-season finale at John Wall Field. This game was won up front, so give mega props to the “big uglies,” as they call them, guys who never get any glory.

That’d be Swartzendruber, fellow tackle Javen Donald, guards Justin Velky and Jace Tonne, center Aiden Packard, fullback Brandon Brune and tight ends David Fason and Bennett Koch. Those guys imposed their will upon their opponent.

Brune had a touchdown run, tailback Quinton Alexander two. Fason caught a 57-yard touchdown pass from Wyatt Eash, as Prairie (4-5) rolled to a 21-0 halftime lead and hung on.

“There’s nothing better,” Swartzendruber said. “After halftime, we tried to go back to our zone offense. Then we went back to our iso because it was working the whole first half. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”

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“We thought we could be more physical than them,” said Prairie Coach Kyle Knock. “Then also you talk about taking the football out of their hands. When you can run six or seven minutes off the clock …”

Prairie had a scoring drive that lasted six minutes and 42 seconds, another that went 4:21. Time of possession was dominated by the Hawks, keeping a high-octane West offense averaging 43.6 points off the field.

Prairie was able to literally run the final 3:15 off the clock. On a third-and-4 play at the Hawks 34, Alexander ran straight up the middle for 5 yards and a first down that iced it.

He finished with 93 yards on 15 carries. BJay Bush Jr. led the way with 125 yards on 14 carries, with Talan Jackson adding 65 on 11 carries.

“Just an energy thing,” Alexander said. “I just knew that the team needed me, and I had to step up … I’d live and die for these guys.”

Butali Butali had 128 yards rushing and a touchdown for West (5-4). Quarterback Jack Wallace completed 16 of 21 passes for 139 yards, running for a score.

The Trojans also ran back a blocked punt for a score. They played much of the game without leading receiver Mason Woods, who injured his leg in a game last week.

Prairie was able to rebound from an excruciating overtime loss to second-ranked Bettendorf last week, giving itself a shot at a playoff berth.

“If we’d have won a couple more along the way, it’d have been nice. We might get in. We’ll see,” Knock said. ”These kids, they just show up every day. We’ve grown and grown and grown as the season has gone on. You’ve seen it day in and day out.

“I told them last Friday night that we weren’t mathematically eliminated. I said as long as there’s a chance, we’re going to keep playing. We’re going to play football until they tell us we can’t. We talked a lot about controlling what we could control this week, and that was winning a football game. We had total focus, had everybody on board, had a great week of practice. These kids really want a shot to go do it again.”

In the end, Prairie was the 17th team in Class 5A RPI, the first team not to get in. West finished 14th in the 5A RPI and is a playoff squad.

First-round pairings will be released Saturday morning.

Comments: jeff.johnson@thegazette.com