Hounds capitalize on turnovers in win over Hawks

DONNELLSON — Derek Doherty said his Fort Madison defense “wasn’t happy” after last Friday’s loss against West Burlington-Notre Dame.
“And I’m thankful that they weren’t happy,” the Bloodhounds’ coach said.
The Bloodhounds silenced Central Lee’s offense for three quarters, taking advantage of five turnovers by the Hawks in a 28-12 win on Friday night.
There have been lessons learned by Fort Madison (2-1) in the last couple of weeks. The 42-21 loss last week to WB-ND hurt, and although the finish of this game was a little rocky for the Bloodhounds, it was another education with the beginning of district play looming in two weeks.
“I think that's part of the growth for a lot of our kids,” Doherty said. “I mean, we're still fairly young, and we’re learning to be competitors for four whole quarters, and we're going to keep chipping away at it.”
Central Lee (2-1) lost four fumbles and had an interception, and the Bloodhounds converted those mistakes into four scores — three touchdown passes from Owen Huffman to Aurelio Jaciunde and a 3-yard touchdown run by Moses Thacher late in the third quarter to close the scoring for Fort Madison.
“Killed us,” Central Lee coach Doug Dodds said of the turnovers. “They just killed us. We’ve got to take care of the football. It was disappointing because we had some big yardage gains and got us some flips in field position. We were in position, and we were moving the ball, and then we would turn over the football. And you can’t win football games doing that.”
“We were punching at the ball, and we got an interception and some fumbles and things like that,” Doherty said. “We really prioritize takeaways and tackling physical. And I feel like for the most part, we did that.”
Fort Madison opened the scoring late in the first quarter when Huffman flipped the ball ahead to Jaciunde sweeping from the left side, and Jaciunde darted to the end zone for a 7-yard touchdown and a 7-0 lead.
Huffman threw a 50-yard TD pass from Jaciunde midway through the second quarter, then a 20-yarder with five seconds left in the half to give Fort Madison a 21-0 halftime lead.

Thacher, who had 175 rushing yards on 30 carries, scored with 3:55 left in the third quarter to push the lead to 28-0.
Fort Madison had 378 offensive yards for the game. Huffman threw for 152 yards and three TDs.
“We knew coming in that they had a big physical line in the front, and they did a nice job,” Dodds said. “And we just had to elevate ourselves to play better.”
Central Lee then got going in the fourth quarter. Kellen Weber threw an 11-yard touchdown pass to Jonny Seyb, then Weber had a 2-yard touchdown run with 53 seconds left for the final margin.
“I think that's always big,” Dodds said of the late surge. “It showed that when we took care of the football, good things were going to happen.”
“Late in the game, and maybe I'm nitpicking here, but I wasn't happy with how we backed off the gas,” Doherty said. “We can’t do that when we get into district games.”
Central Lee opens Class 2A District 6 play next Friday with a home game against West Liberty.
“That’s what we told the kids,” Dodds said. “Tonight was a game we wanted to win, but now the real stuff begins.”
Fort Madison plays host to Mount Vernon in the final non-district game next Friday.
“That’s going to be a tough task, everyone knows that,” Doherty said. “We just need to play our best game.”