JUNCTION CITY — Through Philomath High’s first seven football games this fall, its offensive scheme revolved entirely around a potent passing attack with little focus on trying to pick up yards on the ground. After struggling to establish a running presence in an Oct. 18 loss to Cascade, coach Alex Firth knew it was time to really hone in on that part of his team’s attack.
But with senior Grant Niemann on the sidelines after suffering an injury on the final play of the first half against the Cougars, could Philomath just flip a switch and start impacting games without relying so much on its passing?
Gallery: PHS football at Junction City (Oct. 25, 2024)
A collection of photos from Philomath High’s 42-34 football victory at Junction City on Friday.
Enter Lake Mulberry, a tough-nosed junior with a wrestling background who had moved from the line into the backfield. In Friday night’s 42-34 victory at Junction City, Mulberry routinely picked up chunk yards while taking advantage of effective blocking and dragging would-be tacklers downfield with him when defenders were able to get their hands on him.
When time ran out in the fourth quarter, Mulberry had 164 yards and a touchdown on 25 carries.
As mentioned, Philomath’s struggles in its run attack has been especially noticeable in the Cascade loss.
“We’ve been practicing it,” Mulberry said. “We needed it against Cascade — we only had like three carries or something like that and knew it could help if we could learn how to run the ball a little bit.”
Mulberry played the part effectively against Junction City with an average of 6.6 yards per carry — a number Firth will take any day.
“He’s a big, straight-ahead kid so we worked pretty much all week on downhill run, power counter-type stuff just to try to get him going downhill,” Firth said. “I thought the weather was going to be worse and be pretty muddy so it was kind of our game plan going in — that we’re going to have to run the ball to win.”
Junction City approached the game defensively with intentions of slowing down Philomath’s passing.
“They normally play like a 50 front and they came out in a three-man line to drop everybody to play the pass, which is fine,” Firth said. “We obviously have to find a running game against these teams that are going to play the light box against us.”
Coming back after experiencing a loss for the first time is never easy. It’s those moments that can test the best of teams and it can be especially challenging mentally knowing that a one-win opponent was coming up on the schedule.
Plus, Philomath entered the game without key players — in addition to Niemann, Rocco De La Rosa, Josiah Peters and Jeshua Gonzalez-Bush were in street clothes. Lineman Brady Russell played with a cast on his left hand but had an important presence on the field and recorded a sack on the final play of the first half.
“We just had to step up, you know, we were on our heels the whole entire game (vs. Cascade) and we just had to come back and try to do better this week,” Mulberry said. “I think we thought this team was going to be a rollover and they sure enough came out fighting.”
The Warriors couldn’t stumble against the Tigers with their sights set on the postseason. Junction City led for most of the first half and made it a one-possession game in the fourth quarter. The 34 points scored by the Tigers were the most for the team against any opponent this season.
“I knew we had to win if we wanted to have a chance to make the playoffs,” sophomore receiver-defensive back Kaden Howard said. “So we had to come out and get it done.”
Junction City’s offense caused issues in the first half with its running game. The Tigers finished the game with 204 rushing yards — 144 of those came in the first half. Senior Josh Berry had 110 yards on 19 carries alone at the break and out of the team’s 31 first-half plays, 19 of them involved runs with Berry.
“It’s a single-wing and the deal with it is that they overload you at the point of attack and if you don’t adjust to it, they have a blocking advantage,” Firth said. “I think for a little bit, it was just misalignment. I mean, we just did not have enough guys to one side of that formation … so they basically were pounding us on that two-wing side. And then we fixed it and kind of shut some stuff down.”
Junction City’s success with the run game did slow down significantly in the second half. The Tigers couldn’t do much with its passing game, completing only 1 of 8 all evening — although the one completion was a 20-yard touchdown.
“I knew they weren’t going to pass much and it was pretty obvious,” Firth said. “They put No. 3 in there when they were going to pass and then No. 4 and No. 15 when they were going to run.”
Junction City held the Warriors to a three-and-out to open the game and then scored a touchdown on its first possession, reaching the end zone on a 3-yard run by junior Aden McNamar.
After the two teams traded punts, Philomath got on the scoreboard with 1:17 remaining in the first with senior Caleb Russell falling forward into the end zone on a QB sneak. Two key completions to senior Warwick Bushnell and one to Howard powered the drive.
But Junction City got the momentum back immediately with 5-foot-6 junior Staton Barnes returning the ensuing kickoff 97 yards for a touchdown. Philomath appeared to have him stopped near midfield but the speedy Barnes popped out and sprinted to paydirt.
In fact, Barnes was a problem throughout the game with two other long returns — a 56-yarder to open the second half and a 54-yarder in the fourth quarter. Junction City finished with 220 yards in kickoff return yardage.
Junction City went up 21-7 early in the second quarter with Berry clicking with the run game. But the Warriors finished strong with junior CD Nuno capping a seven-play drive with an 18-yard TD pass from Russell and then senior Hudson Raab scoring on a 9-yard pass from Russell on a drive that covered 69 yards in eight plays.
Raab’s touchdown came on fourth down with 26 seconds left in the half. A pass interference call and catches of 17 and 28 yards by Nuno moved the ball downfield quickly. Add in the Brady Russell sack and the Warriors had momentum going into the break with the score tied, 21-21.
“It was just pulling our heads out of our backside and playing better,” Firth said about the team’s early performance. “We just started off kind of sleepwalking. It’s just one of those things where we just had to come out and settle in and play our game. And we did … we completed a couple of passes and everybody calmed down and we started rolling.”
Howard’s presence on the field has been most noticeable this season on defense as a cornerback who consistently knocks down passes. But his contributions with the offense took a significant step forward with four receptions for 64 yards, including a 17-yard reception in the third quarter on a third-and-goal play.
“It was there — we called the play and it was open,” Howard said about the TD, which was his first in high school. “Everything clicked.”
Mulberry had a key 27-yard run on the drive sparked by a Brady Russell block on the perimeter. Howard’s TD gave Philomath its first lead, 28-21, at the 4:33 mark.
“He caught a nice ball down there on that third down … went up and got it,” Firth said. “He’s got great hands, he’s a good athlete.”
Nuno caught his second TD pass of the evening with 8:55 remaining to give the Warriors some breathing room at 35-21. Nuno juggled the ball for a split second before securing it for the catch to cap an 11-yard drive that had started at Philomath’s own 12 in the last two minutes of the third quarter.
Junction City made it a one-score game with 2:21 remaining on the 20-yard TD pass from junior Kaden Shafer to Barnes. The Tigers had missed an extra point on their touchdown earlier in the quarter so still trailed by eight.
But it didn’t matter because Philomath ran out the final few minutes with three Mulberry runs and a pass completion to Nuno. Russell kneeled in victory formation on the final play.
For the game, Russell completed 20 of 34 passes for 307 yards and four touchdowns and also ran one in with the QB sneak in the first half. Among his receiving corps, Nuno and Bushnell both finished with 100-plus yards. Nuno caught eight balls for 111 yards and Bushnell had six catches for 119 yards.
As a team, Philomath rolled up 469 yards of total offense compared to Junction City’s 224.
Marist Catholic now looms large on Philomath’s schedule with the game coming up Friday at Clemens Field. The Spartans are coming off a 47-0 win over the same Cascade team that crushed the Warriors — although perhaps it can’t really be said it was the same Cougars team with two of their top players out with injuries.
Firth said the Spartans resemble Philomath more than Cascade.
“They’re spread, they throw the ball around,” Firth said. “I think their quarterback’s like the third-leading passer in the state, so they throw the rock around. They have a good receiver in (Aaron) Bidwell and they’re well-coached, good line.”
Marist’s lone loss this season came in Week 3 to a good Henley team, 19-16.
“They have a really good shell (defense) so we’re hoping we can at least run the ball a little bit on them and make them honor the run a little bit and get some guys open,” Mulberry said. “We’ve got some talented receivers out there and we’ve got a good O-line.”
Field conditions could be a factor with rain in the forecast. That means Clemens Field could get a little muddy.
“The field conditions probably aren’t going to be the greatest next Friday so it’s going to come down, I think, again to who can run the rock,” Firth said. “So we’ll just see if we can find the rest of our running game.”
The kickoff at Clemens Field is scheduled for 7 p.m. Friday and will be the regular-season finale.
Said Howard, “It’s going to be a tough one. We’ve got to go into practice and dial in.”
