NORTON — Capping the regular season and bouncing back from back-to-back losses, the Concordia football team defeated Norton 36-6.
The Panther defense showed up early, forcing a three-and-out while pushing Norton back to punt out of their end zone. It took the offense only four plays before the Panthers found the end zone, after Drake Blochlinger got pushed out at the Bluejay 1-yard line on a 32-yard run, Braytin Hake punched it in to put the Panthers up 7-0. After a huge kick return that gave the Bluejays the ball at the Panther 44-yard line, the Panther defense shut down Norton and forced another punt. The Bluejays stalled the Panthers and forced a punt from their own end zone, before driving down the field and scoring their only points of the game to make it a 7-6 game. The Bluejay defense continued to hinder the Panthers, and after a failed fake punt, Norton started their drive on the Panther side of the field as the first quarter ended.
Norton decided to go for it on fourth down to start the second quarter, but the Panther defense hunkered down and after a fumbled pitch, Blochlinger forced another fumble to give the Panthers the momentum. Two penalties took touchdowns off the board before Blochlinger found Krier for a 14-yard touchdown to make it a 14-6 game. On the following kickoff, Burke Kindel forced a fumble that the Panthers recovered on the Norton 8-yard line. With the short field, Blochlinger scored on a goal-line push to go up 21-6. Norton was able to drive down the field into the red zone. On a fourth-down attempt, the ball slipped out of the Bluejay quarterback’s hands, but was ruled a pass attempt, leading to a turnover on downs. Having one more touchdown called back from a penalty, both teams went into the locker room with Concordia leading 21-6.
Concordia’s offense didn’t slow down in the second half, with Blochlinger punching into the end zone to go up 29-6. After Norton played keep-away for most of the third quarter, draining significant time, Concordia got the ball back and scored their final touchdown before bringing in some backups as the Panthers won 36-6.
Blochlinger went 8-12 passing for 152 yards and one touchdown, with 22 carries for 126 yards and three touchdowns.
Hake had 47 yards on 10 carries with a touchdown.
Krier had 88 yards on five catches with a touchdown. Parker Jackson had 36 yards on two catches. Kale Schroeder had 28 yards on two catches.
Jackson led in tackles with 11; Kindel and Koehn Williams both had 10 tackles.
