By David Paulsen
Sports Correspondent
A season that started with three consecutive wins ended disappointingly Friday for the Whitewater High School football team with a 48-28 loss at East Troy. The loss ended any hopes of making the playoffs and gave the Whippets a 4-5 record overall. The boys were 2-5 in the Rock Valley Conference.
The team began the season with wins over Palmyra-Eagle, state-ranked Columbus, and Beloit Turner, but was able to gain only one more win the rest of the way. A heartbreaking, last-second loss to Evansville was a key loss.
Injuries played a major role in those losses as the team had numerous players on the bench over the remaining games on the schedule. That was evident in the loss to East Troy, as many of the injured players played defensively in the secondary.
That left a depleted secondary defending against a pass-happy Trojan squad, and the result was 524 passing yards for East Troy. East Troy quarterback Brandon Matz completed 30 of 33 pass attempts, had five touchdown passes and was not intercepted.
Head coach Anthoni Parr said the offensive game plan against the Trojans worked well as Whitewater rushed for over 340 yards and passes for an additional 102 yards. That meant the Whippets had over 440 yards of offense.
“It was mainly our inability to stop their passing game,” Parr said. “That goes back to our injuries.”
Turnovers were also a factor in this game as quarterback Scott Gorsuch threw two interceptions and the Whippets lost one fumble.
“We had a couple of turnovers that hurt us,” Parr noted. “We had a strip that was returned for a touchdown.”
That strip took place after East Troy had tied the game at 28-28 at about the nine minute mark of the fourth quarter. Just 18 seconds later, Whitewater fumbled on the Trojan 48 yard line, and East Troy returned the fumble 52 yards and took a 35-28 lead.
Whitewater took a 7-0 lead at the 8:44 mark of the first quarter when John Saylor scored on a 57-yard scamper. Saylor ended up with 216 yards rushing on 23 attempts, for a 9.4 yard average per attempt.
East Troy tied the game at 7-7 on a 15-yard pass with 1:25 to go in the first quarter.
The Whippets took a 14-7 lead when Gorsuch connected with Anthony Juoni on an 18-yard touchdown pass with 11:30 to go in the second quarter.
East Troy came right back with a 30-yard TD pass with 5:53 to go before half to tie the game at 14-14.
Just a minute and a half later, East Troy struck again through the air, this time on a 28-yard scoring pass. That gave the Trojans a 21-14 lead at the half.
Whitewater rallied, though, scoring the next two touchdowns.
A two-yard scoring pass from Gorsuch to Juoni made it 21-21 in the third quarter and a two-yard run by Daniel Soto gave the Whippets a 28-21 lead.
That run came after a Gorsuch to Juoni pass put Whitewater on the East Troy two-yard line.
Juoni was the one bright spot for the Whippets. Juoni, who had missed the last several games due to an injury, returned for this game and caught five passes for 92 yards and two TDs.
The bottom fell out after the Soto scoring run as East Troy put up 27 unanswered points to pull away with the victory. Two turnovers, including the fumble returned for a TD, were also a part of that stretch.
Overall season
Parr, in his first season as head coach, was optimistic about the season.
“I believe it was a very successful season, especially with the amount of injuries we had,” Parr said. “Our kids improved a ton.”
Parr noted that the team had one of its best off-seasons prior to the start of the season in the weight room. He believes that if the boys continue to weight train and condition, duplicating what they did the past off-season, and even improving on it, that such an effort will also help reduce injuries next year.
Although the Whippets had nine seniors on the team this year, only three came with any significant varsity experience.
Quarterback Scott Gorsuch is one of the seniors who will be graduating, but Parr noted that he should have two younger quarterbacks competing for that starting spot next season.
In addition, two running backs – John Saylor and Jordan Peterson – will be back.
“That will be the biggest bright spot,” Parr said.
