Tea Area football edges out Yankton 38-28 with dominant run game to stay unbeaten

YANKTON — All Tea Area needed was a first down.

It was fourth down with 55.9 seconds left in the game, and the Titans, needing just 5 yards to seal the win at 31-28 at Crane-Youngworth Field, knew Yankton would be expecting a run. They couldn't stop it all game. They'll send everything they have to stop it. So, Tea Area head coach Scott Frey thought he'd give them something different. He called for a quick screen to senior running back Blake Thompson.

"It's on me," Thompson thought to himself. But he knew the blocks were there. He just needed to do something. Senior quarterback Maddix Slykhuis dished to him quick, and he was right: the hole was open. But for more than just five. Thompson kept running up the sideline, toward the end zone and the claim of potential 11AA supremacy, scoring the last-and-final touchdown of the game to cap off a 38-28 win to send the Titans to 5-0 on the season and hand No. 3 Yankton (3-2) its second loss.

"It's real fun, especially when you have the holes I have," Thompson said. "All you've got to do is run the ball."

The Titans won the game the way they usually do, dominating the line of scrimmage and running the ball. Tea Area senior quarterback Maddix Slykhuis threw just one pass (a 16-yard completion) as the Titans ran 64 times for 430 yards. Senior running back Chase Van Tol had 28 of those attempts for 225 yards and a touchdown while Thompson rushed 15 times for 155 yards and three scores, including the game-clincher at the end.

Tea Area proved its a worthy contender to No. 1 Pierre

Tea Area remains in a territory occupied by few in the state, turning to the back-half of their schedule without a loss and having beaten two of the three best teams it will face in the season. It sets them up, as they were expected to be, as No. 1 Pierre's top challenger and a program that year-after-year will not go away.

"They don't quit," Tea Area head coach Scott Frey said. "And they will never quit."

The game started fast, and stayed that way. Tea Area got the ball first and moved down the field with the running game, scoring the opening touchdown as Slykhuis kept the ball and ran in unbothered. Yankton responded just as quickly, also with its quarterback, but through the air.

Senior quarterback Rugby Ryken (20-27 passing for 264 yards and three touchdowns) hit junior tight end Tucker Gilmore for a first down. Then he hit Gilmore again. Then Ryken found sophomore running back Matthew Sheldon for a big-gainer to the outside. Yankton, just in a different way as Tea, was grooving. Bucks junior running back Shaylor Platt (13 rushes for 44 yards and a score) ran to the outside for a touchdown, tying the game and starting a trend.

Whenever one team scored, the other responded. Yankton forced a fumble the next Tea Area drive, which pushed them into the front-end of that sequence after Ryken hit junior receiver Austin Gobel (three catches for 20 yards and a score) on the run for a touchdown to make it 14-7 Bucks. But Tea Area followed quickly after senior running back/receiver Blake Thompson zig-zagged for a long rushing score to tie the game again.

After Ryken threw to senior wide receiver Cody Oswald for a touchdown. Tea Area got a touchdown before the half as Van Tol layed a huge hit on a Yankton defender on his way to the end zone. He stared down at the defender he deposited on the floor and flexed his arms. Perhaps, that was the momentum. Not in this game. On the extra point try, Yankton senior Mac Ryken came around on the edge and blocked the try, swinging it back again like a pendulum. The Bucks kept a 21-20 lead headed into the half.

'We're almost a better team in the second half'

Tea hadn't lost the momentum totally — the Titans had another long drive that ended with a missed 40-yard field goal by Van Tol — but Yankton was riding off the momentum of the first-quarter fumble. The Titans try to get three a game, Frey said, and to that point they had none. Tea needed a takeaway of their own. Early in the third quarter, they got it. Ryken, trying to create something as the Titans swarmed, lost control of the ball. Senior defensive lineman Nike Rosas was already on his knees, but he bear-crawled and fell on top of the ball. "Huge," Frey said. And, just like that, it was a new game.

"I feel like we're almost a better team in the second half," Van Tol said.

Tea had found its play to swing the pendulum back, and the Titans marched down the field after the fumble and Thompson converted on his second touchdown of the game to make it 28-21 after Tea converted on the two-point conversion. Yankton came back with a huge touchdown throw from Ryken to sophomore running back Evan Serck to tie the game at 28, but in a game with few empty drives, now it was the Bucks that were responding to Tea.

Van Tol drilled a 38-yard field goal after a long drive to give Tea the lead back, 31-28, then Yankton went three-and-out. With 55.9 seconds to go in the game, Yankton had one last chance to extend the game on fourth down. But this game was Tea's to control.

"Hey guys," Frey said to his team in the huddle. "You get this first down, that's the game."

They needed 5 yards. Thompson, and the undefeated Titans, got more.

Follow Sioux Falls Argus Leader reporter Michael McCleary on Twitter @mikejmccleary.