The Cardinals’ Perfect Season

OAKESDALE - After eking out a tough 14-13 victory over TOR on that team's soggy bottom field in Oakesdale Friday night, the Cardinals face a dangerously fast-running Reardan Indians team at home this weekend. The loser-out regional playoff matchup starts at 7 p.m. on Friday.

Though not pretty, the Cardinals' final win late last week gave them a perfect 9-0 season, the first one of its kind since 1967, according to local sports historian and booster Ross Hamann.

But if WP thought its mistbound "fist fight" against the Nighthawks was a challenge, facing Reardan may be its biggest test yet compared even to the teams they may play after this first playoff round if they win, head coach Jeff Bartlow said.

"They're very good," he said about a team that has won three state championships since 2000. "This is way harder than the second round we might face."

Bartlow, who has been watching films of the Indians' games since he learned they would be the Cardinals' next opponent, said the key to beating Reardon is to stop their run, which is led by their 165-pound quarterback Chance Bell.

Bell is a track star like WP's Kris Cady. He was the 200-meter champion sprinter among all B schools this year, and if he makes it into the open, "He'll be very hard to catch," Bartlow said. "He's the most dangerous player in the league."

The Cardinals focused on honing their defensive skills in practice this week. If they can stop or slow the Reardan run, it will force Bell to go to the air - a much riskier strategy for the Indians, particularly since WP has developed a knack for capitalizing on turnovers this season.

While getting into a more physical mode on defense, the Cardinals have to do what they can to improve their offense, which all but fell apart during the second half of Friday's game in Oakesdale, Bartlow said.

That means better protec­tion of the quarterback so he has more time to pass the ball, getting the ball off better and sustaining blocks.

Worried about the Cardi­nals' offense since the start of the season, Bartlow said WP did well in that depart­ment for many of its games this season but on Friday, the line struggled big time after the half. The Cardinals scored all their points in the first half - a first-quarter Cady touchdown run from the 1-yard line, a 3-yard T.J. Hofer touchdown reception and a 2-point Hofer conversion reception.

The Nighthawks an­swered in the second quarter with their own 1-yard run into the end zone and a good kick for the extra point. Then, in the second half, Cady made an uncharacteristic mistake when he muffed a TOR punt, turning it into a life ball a Nighthawks player picked up and ran to the WP 7-yard line. TOR got the touchdown but not the kick. Cady grabbed the first opportunity to redeem himself by block­ing the extra-point attempt. As the defensive standoff wore on, and an eerie pre-Halloween mist shrouded the field, the blocked kick turned into the Cardinals' winning margin. Though only barely, the defense held, keeping TOR runners to short or negative yardage and break­ing up key passes. This is where Cady took a second shot at redemption by intercepting a TOR pass and running it back to midfield. "The defense showed up to play," Bartlow said.

They will need to do so again on Friday. WP is one of four top teams from District 9 to play against the best teams from District 7, where Reardan is ranked fourth (5-3 overall). If the Cardinals win, they will be one of four teams from the region to move to the 16 finalists for the state championship and host the following game at home as well, probably against Col­fax, Bartlow said.

WP vs TOR

14-13

WP 6 8 0 0 14

TOR 0 7 6 0 13

Rushing: Kris Cady 11 for 23, Zach Bartlow 10 for 12, Justin Armstrong 1 for 1.

Passing: 15 out of 25 for 123.

Receiving: Anthony Powell 5 for 28, T.J. Hofer 5 for 35, Cady 2 for 36, Hernandez 2 for 16 and Dalton Estes 1 for 8.