Polk County received a painful reminder Friday of one of the oldest maxims in football.
It’s awfully hard to score points when you don’t have the ball.
Owen’s ground-oriented attack ground down the Wolverines, with Hayden Burpeau’s 40-yard field goal with 1:39 remaining spoiling Polk County’s Homecoming and giving the Warhorses a 17-14 victory in G.M. Tennant Stadium.
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Owen (3-2, 1-0) kept the ball for more than 17 of the second half’s 24 minutes, limiting Polk County (2-3, 0-1) to just 18 offensive plays in the final two quarters. Yet the Wolverines still had a chance to win or tie their Western Highlands Conference opener in the closing seconds.
Taking over at the Warhorse 20 following Burpeau’s boot, Polk quickly moved into Owen territory on Brody Wilkins’ 31-yard run. A 14-yard pass to Loreynzo Sanchez, plus a horse collar penalty, moved the Wolverines to the Owen 20 with just under a minute remaining.
But Wilkins was pressured into scrambling on two pass attempts, gaining just two yards. With Polk out of timeouts, Wilkins spiked the ball on third down, bringing on Blake Anderson for a potential game-tying field goal. A delay of game penalty pushed Anderson’s attempt back to 39 yards, but the senior kicker never got a chance for the try – a high snap forced Sanchez, the holder, to scramble and eventually try a pass downfield that fell incomplete.
“We knew it was going to be that type of game, limited posessions, and we had to take advantage of ours,” said Polk County head coach Dustin Fry. “It just didn’t feel like we could get anything going. We’d move the ball and get a penalty or something would happen. We just couldn’t get into a rhythm.
“That’s the kind of game we knew it would be. We hoped we could steal a possession of some type and flip that, and we never could.”
Frustration filled Fry’s voice, and understandably so. Polk County outgained Owen, holding the Warhorses to just 200 total yards while amassing 305 of its own. Sanchez carried 25 times for 189 yards in surpassing the 1,000-yard mark for the season, the Wolverines’ first 1,000-yard rusher since Angus Weaver in 2022. Polk held an opponent below 20 points for the second straight week, the first time that’s happened since the 2021 season.
But untimely penalties – Polk drew nine flags for 89 yards, seven of those in the first half – and a key first-quarter turnover helped stymie the Wolverines’ first-half scoring chances. Not having the ball much in the final two periods did the same.
“We just kept stalling out, whether from penalties or just killing ourselves,” Fry said. “That first half and those penalties. Every time we got a big play, penalty. It’s just one of those things where we beat ourselves again.”
Nolan Simpson’s 40-yard return of the opening kickoff helped get Polk started on a high note. Sanchez added to that with a 43-yard touchdown scamper on Polk’s sixth snap, with Blake Anderson’s extra point putting the Wolverines up 7-0.
Owen answered with a nine-play, 70-yard scoring drive, the points coming from Stephen Anderson’s 1-yard run, then quickly regained possesson as Emerson Autrey picked off a Wilkins pass near midfield and returned it to the 24. The Warhorses covered those 24 yards in six plays, with Emmett Minks tossing an 8-yard scoring pass to Burpeau as the Warhorses took a 14-7 lead with 10:45 left in the first half.
Polk answered with its longest drive of the evening, a 15-play epic hampered by two key holding penalties, the second coming after Simpson had caught a pass inside the Owen 10. The Wolverines eventually settled for an Anderson 38-yard field goal try that was blocked.
The Wolverines evened the score late in the third period as Sanchez slipped behind the Owen secondary and hauled in a 35-yard touchdown pass. The teams swapped possessions ending on downs before Owen ate up almost seven minutes of valuable fourth-quarter time in setting up Burpeau’s game-winning kick.
Polk County continues conference play next Friday, kicking off a three-game road trip at Mitchell.
OWEN 17, POLK COUNTY 14
Owen 7 7 0 3 — 17
Polk County 7 0 7 0 — 14
FIRST QUARTER
PC – Loreynzo Sanchez 43 run (Blake Anderson kick), 9:59
O – Stephen Anderson 1 run (Hayden Burpeau kick), 3:06
SECOND QUARTER
O – Burpeau 8 pass from Emmett Minks (Burpeau kick), 10:45
THIRD QUARTER
PC – Sanchez 35 pass from Brody Wilkins (Anderson kick), 3:16
FOURTH QUARTER
O – Burpeau 40 field goal, 1:39
INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS
Rushing
O – Stephen Anderson 13-51, Hayden Burpeau 9-49, Emmett Minks 11-29. Haiden Small 8-20, Thomas Russell 1-1. PC – Loreynzo Sanchez 25-189, Brody Wilkins 3-33, Mykah Hills 2-11.
Passing
O – Emmett Minks 6-13-0-53. PC – Brody Wilkins 6-9-1-72, Loreynzo Sanchez 0-1-0-0.
Receiving
O – Haiden Small 2-24, Hayden Burpeau 1-14, Stephen Anderson 2-9, Slade Gardner 1-6. PC – Loreynzo Sanchez 3-63, Styler Blackwell 3-9.
