Knights’ Penley: ‘We’re going to lose some excellent football players’
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RUSSELL -- The Eisenhower Knights (2-8, 2-4 Region 3) went into Friday night's game against Saegertown (7-3, 4-2 Region 2) hoping for a win, unfortunately they fell to the Panthers 21-0.
The two teams battled for field position as they exchanged multiple punts throughout the first half until Saegertown was able to turn one of the Eisenhower punts into points when the Panthers' Riley Wilkerson returned one for an 85-yard touchdown late in the second quarter to take a 7-0 lead into halftime.
The Eisenhower offense moved the ball in the first half, but the offense stalled and ended on downs on back-to-back drives.
The Eisenhower defense held the Panthers offense to minus-15 yards in the first half and Knights defensive lineman Jacob Stuart ended a Panthers drive with his first career interception.
The Eisenhower defense continued to do its part in the second half, forcing punts to end drives.
The final quarter saw the Panthers score a pair of rushing touchdowns when Wilkerson scored from 24 yards out and Parker Adkins added a touchdown from the 6-yard line to make the final score 21-0 in favor of Saegertown.
Eisenhower's Nolan Gesing led all rushers with 99 yards on 21 carries, which put him at 1,139 yards for the season.
"I thought we played well tonight, especially in the first half, but our problem was finishing drives," Eisenhower head coach Jim Penley said. "We played well on defense, especially in the first half, holding them to zero positive yards."
Eisenhower finished the season with a 2-8 record and showed its inexperience over the season, but Penley saw positive improvement as the season progressed and is hopeful that will be a positive.
"We are going to lose some excellent football players, but we have a great base coming back," the veteran coach said. "We have a lot of talent in the freshman and sophomore classes that got a lot of experience this year and hopefully that bodes well for us in the future."