Iola quarterback Ben Cooper’s night didn’t start out in the fashion that he had hoped.
The senior’s first pass of the game found the hands of Burlington defensive back Brogan Nordstedt and the Wildcat senior made the interception on the game’s third play from scrimmage.
Fortunately for the Mustangs, Cooper was able to quickly turn his night around after the uncharacteristic mistake and lead his team to a 33-12 victory in Iola’s first game in district play.
Burlington cashed in on the Nordstedt interception with a 9-yard touchdown run from Tucker Whitworth to take a 6-0 lead.
Iola answered back by leaning on Cooper and allowing the quarterback to use his legs to loosen up the Wildcat defense. Cooper ran the ball Three-straight plays for 27 yards to jump-start the drive.
“We saw against Rossville (last week), that they were flying to the jet-sweep, so we put in a fake-sweep quarterback keeper and it worked,” Cooper said.
Cooper capped the drive with a precision throw to senior Joey Zimmerman, who ran right down the seam of the defense from his slot receiver position and caught the ball — which was perfectly placed over the out-stretched hand of a Burlington safety — in the end zone for a touchdown.
Braden Plumlee’s extra point gave Iola the lead for good, even though it appeared that it may be short-lived.
On the ensuing kick-off, the Burlington return man broke into the open field and was one-on-one with Plumlee, but the Iola senior saved the touchdown with a big open-field tackle.
Two plays later, a fumble gave Iola the ball back and after a long run from Cooper, sophomore Tayton Driskel pounded the ball into the end zone and extended the lead to 14-6 in the second quarter.
Both team’s defenses were able to make adjustments and stop the opposing offenses for the next two drives. The defensive highlight play for Iola came in an unsuspecting way with senior nose tackle Trea Williams making an interception on a tipped pass to put the Mustangs in control of the field position battle.
“It felt amazing,” Williams said.
The field position battle paid off for Iola later in the half, when the Mustangs took control of the ball with 49 seconds left at the Burlington 37.
Cooper found Ethan Scheibmeir for a 25-yard gain off a scramble to start the drive and on the next play he hit Zimmerman for a 12-yard scoring strike to give the Mustangs a 21-6 lead.
“(Opponents) can’t just key on Joey or (Ethan) Holloway anymore,” Cooper said. “They have to worry about all four of our receivers (Zimmerman, Holloway, Scheibmeir and Isaac Vink).”
Driskel made sure the lead stayed there with a forced fumble to end the next Burlington drive and Iola went to the locker room with all the momentum.
