Colfax football earns first win at Eleva-Strum

By Cara L. Dempski

STRUM — Colfax had to wait six weeks to win a football game in 2016.

This year, they tacked a “W” onto their record in week two.

Colfax traveled to Eleva-Strum Central High School Friday night, August 25 after making a decent, albeit scoreless, showing at Ellsworth the previous week.

The Vikings walked away later that evening in possession of a 1-1 record after besting the Cardinals 30-22. Colfax will remain on the road for a third straight Friday night when they head to Spring Valley September 1 for the first Dunn-St. Croix match-up.

The game was not perfect, but a win this early in the season is encouraging for a team that went winless for much of last year. 

While the first half was not as coach Matt DeMoe would have liked, the Vikings put away the Cards late with 16 points in the fourth quarter.

“We made a few mistakes in the first half, but we battled hard and stayed positive the whole game,” DeMoe noted. “In the fourth quarter, we leaned heavily on our offensive line and Brett Schindler, our running back.”

While Schindler rushed for 229 yards and three touchdowns over the course of the evening, it was an interception and run from Adam Pretasky that set up the go-ahead touchdown for the Vikings.

Colfax got on the scoreboard first when quarterback Noah Albricht connected with Tommy Anderson on a 10-yard touchdown pass. The extra point kick failed.

The Cardinals’ answered as Andrew Schoen returned a punt 38 yards for the home team’s first socre. Eleva-Strum quarterback Ryan Johnson found Drew Severson on the conversion attempt, which left the Cards with an 8-6 lead after 12 minutes of play.

The Vikings retook the lead in the second quarter when Schindler punched through the line on a five-yard run before Albricht targeted Treyton Teige for the two-point conversion and a 14-8 lead.

But Eleva-Strum come back once again as Johnson connected with Severson again for both a touchdown pass, that covered 32 yards, and the conversion that gave the Cards a 16-14 halftime lead.

The Cards extended their lead in the third after Johnson and Severson made a second pitch-and-catch connection for six, this one covering 54 yards. The kick for the point after was no good, but the Eleva-Strum squad held a 22-14 advantage as the contest headed into its final quarter.

The game belonged to Brett Schindler in the fourth, as he scored a pair of touchdowns, a conversion run, and a conversion reception to help the Vikings retake the lead 30-22.

Schindler second and third touchdown runs of the game came from a yard away. The senior running back added the two-point run after the first fourth-quarter score to knot the game at 22 and then hauled in Albricht’s conversion pass on the latter to give Colfax an 8-point cushion.  

From that point on, all the Vikings needed to do was keep the Cards in check. And they did.

Sophomore quarterback Noah Albricht, who threw for a score and was twice intercepted,  made 12 completions out of 20 attempts and finished with 118 yards passing. Pretasky led the receivers with 56 yards on four catches, Schindler had a reception for 13 yards and junior Tommy Anderson and sophomore Trey Hovde each recorded ten-yard catches – Anderson’s went for a score.

Schindler accounted for 229 rushing yards and three of the Vikings’ four touchdowns as well as a pair of two-point conversions, and Albricht posted two for a total of 231.

Colfax will travel to Spring Valley September 1 before finally hosting its home opener on September 8 against Glenwood City.

COLFAX 30, ELEVA-STRUM 22
Colfax……………………….6  8  0  16 – 30
Eleva-Strum…………….….8  8  6   0 – 22

First quarter
C – T. Anderson 10-yd. pass from N. Albricht (kick fail), 7:47; ES – A. Schoen 38-yd. run (D. Severson pass from R. Johnson), 1:51.

Second quarter
C – B. Schindler 5-yd.  run (T. Teige pass from N. Albricht), 6:31; ES – D. Severson 32-yd. pass from R. Johnson (D. Severson pass from R. Johnson), 1:12.

Third quarter 
ES – D. Severson 54-yd. pass from R. Johnson (kick fail), 7:40.

Fourth quarter
C – B. Schindler 1-yd. run (B. Schindler run), 11:15; C – B. Schindler 1-yd. run (B. Schindler pass from N. Albricht), 7:23.

Individual Statistics:

Passing (att-comp-yds-int) – C (20-12-118-2) – N. Albricht 20-12-11-2; ES (12-9-181-1) – R. Johnson 11-8-171-1, B. Gibson 1-1-10-0.

Rushing (att-yds) – C (36-231) – B. Schindler 35-229, N. Albricht 1-2; ES (31-87) – R. Johnson 10-20, D. Severson 1-(-3), G. Miland 16-72, A. Aguilar 4-(-2).