Prep Football Playoff Rewind: North Linn upsets Pekin to make it to the quarterfinals for only fourth time in school history

CEDAR RAPIDS - When you don’t lose until the final game of the regular season, you wonder how your football team will respond in the playoffs.

When you don’t lose until the final game of the regular season, and it’s by a 42-0 margin, you really wonder how your football team is going to respond in the playoffs.

The answer is very, very well for North Linn.

The Lynx blew past Columbus Junction, 59-14, in last week’s Class A first round. They completely stifled seventh-ranked and unbeaten Pekin offensively Friday night, 21-3, in a second-round win on the road.

“I thought that Columbus game was a get-right game for us,” said North Linn Coach Jared Collum. “We fixed some things. We just didn’t line up well against Wapsie on both sides of the ball. And they outcoached us. We’d like to have that game back, but whatever. Hindsight is 20-20.

“We got to where we wanted to get to anyway. Obviously you get a little better draw if you win that game, but it is what it is. The goal is always to give yourself a chance to go to the Dome, and that’s where we’re at.”

To get to the UNI-Dome in Cedar Falls for a Class A semifinal game, 10th-ranked North Linn (9-1) must beat No. 1 Saint Ansgar this coming Friday night in a quarterfinal, again on the road. NL only has been a quarterfinalist three others times: in 1976, 1992 and 2022.

The school never has reached the semis.

“They run the flex bone, are big, have a mini-Cam Skattebo in that (Corbin) Michels kid,” Collum said. “He’s like 5-4, 180. He’s a bowling ball, runs hard, runs fast ... It’s going to be about assignment football and getting in gaps and tackling.”

North Linn has played really good defense all season, with the exception of the Wapsie Valley game. It limited Pekin (9-1) to 45 total yards, the Panthers’ points set up by an interception and long return late in the first half.

Quarterback Will Sommerfelt threw three touchdowns for North Linn, all on fourth-down passes. They were to Waylon Raue (7 yards), Braden Wheatley (12 yards) and Brody Martin (22 yards).

Martin rushed 32 times for 128 yards as North Linn ran massive amounts of time off the clock in the second half. Collum credited Wheatley for catching Pekin’s Henry Adam from behind to save a touchdown after Adam’s interception.

“Probably the play of the game,”he said. “They score there, and we’ve got a ballgame. The momentum switched. But they kicked that field goal, and I don’t think they ever threatened again ... Our defense was locked in.”

Decorah gets gutsy in revenge win over Western Dubuque

Sometimes you’ve just got to go for it. Which Decorah did in its 25-24 Class 4A first-round win at Western Dubuque.

Tanner Caddell scored a touchdown on a 1-yard quarterback sneak with 37 seconds left, then threw a two-point conversion pass to Tommy Sexton as the Vikings (8-2) avenged a 35-17 regular-season loss to eighth-ranked WD (7-3). Caddell rolled right on the conversion and hit Sexton in the right front part of the end zone, just over the goal line.

He was immediately tackled and landed outside the end zone. Officials conferred before confirming Sexton had crossed the goal line initially.

“I loved the play call,” Sexton told the Dubuque Telegraph-Herald. “I knew we’d get it.”

Decorah plays a quarterfinal at No. 6 Pella, which got a late field goal to get past Davenport North in the first round.

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Laken Caves does it again for Alburnett

Junior running back Laken Caves rushed 25 times for 267 yards and four touchdowns as No. 8 Alburnett brushed past Waukon, 34-16, in a Class 2A second-round game at Alburnett.

Caves also caught two passes, had six tackles defensively (four solo), ran back two kickoffs and a punt. And punted twice.

Alburnett (8-2) plays a 2A quarterfinal this coming Friday night at third-ranked Osage (10-0), which won its second-rounder over Hampton-Dumont-CAL, 27-7.

Cedar Rapids Prairie comes up short

Drake DeGroote threw a pair of touchdown passes to Louisville commit Jayden McGregory as No. 6 West Des Moines Valley edged ninth-ranked Cedar Rapids Prairie, 26-20, in a 5A first-round game at Valley Stadium.

Prairie (6-4) scored first on a David Fason 1-yard TD run in the first quarter. Valley (8-2) scored the next three touchdowns: a Blake Dorenkamp 24-yard run, a 24-yard McGregory catch and 12-yard McGregory catch.

Fason scored on a 2-yard run in the third quarter to bring Prairie within 20-14, but Valley went on a long scoring drive culminated by a DeGroote 5-yard TD run. Owen Marxen threw a 20-yard touchdown pass to Tae Alexander with 2:14 left to give Prairie a chance, but an onside kick attempt went out of bounds and Valley picked up a first down to ice the game.

Prairie starting quarterback Cael Kongshaug injured a leg in the second quarter and missed the rest of the game.

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