The Turnaround Season: Game Four vs Escanaba
Friday September 17, 2010
The 2009 contest at Escanaba had been one of the worst games in the history of Marquette Senior High School football as Esky racked up 12 touchdowns en route to a 73–0 Homecoming win. That drubbing was unquestionably the low point of Marquette’s recently slain 20-game losing streak, but the 2010 matchup was expected to end in a similar manner — with the boys in red on the losing end of a rivalry game.
Widely considered to be one of the top teams in the Upper Peninsula, Escanaba returned a slew of talented starters and entered the week with a 3–0 record. Led by legendary head coach (and current MSHS assistant) Dan Flynn, the offense featured future Northern Michigan University athlete Austin Young at quarterback, running back Alex DeHaan, tight end Ian DeMarse, and wideout Jared Dagenais. This was a foursome who had proven to be more than capable of running up the score, putting up 52 and 45 points in the two weeks prior.
Three weeks into the season, the consensus regarding Marquette’s resurgent football program was that they were a feel-good team who had stumbled their way into a couple of victories. Entering Week Four, they were still considered heavy underdogs where a successful season would have meant finishing fourth in the Great Northern Conference instead of their traditional fifth. Excitement was, nonetheless, high. In recognition of how far the program had already come, there was even a joke going around the press box that there would have to be a statue erected for Coach L’Huillier, since he’d led the squad to two straight wins. With a multitude of storylines coming to a head before the first conference tilt of 2010, the largest test to date had arrived.
The contest could not have started worse for Marquette or its home fans, as the visitors rattled off a screen pass that went for 59 yards to put them in the red zone on the MSHS 10-yard line. On the verge of allowing an early score, the Marquette defense held firm and made up for the early lapse as they forced an Escanaba fumble to get the ball back without surrendering points on the opening drive.
Throughout the game, Marquette benefitted from putting together long drives that consumed clock and ended with points. Schematically, one of the biggest differences for this game was Escanaba’s decision to put as many as 9 players in the box in hopes of neutralizing the running game of Pentecost and Koonala. That alignment created situations where Nick Emmendorfer’s passing attack was relied upon, as he threw touchdown passes to fellow seniors Colin Terry and Chris Forsberg to put the home team up 14–0 at halftime. A healthy mix of pounding the rock with clever passing plays had MSHS humming and made fans hungry for payback against the team who had dealt a shellacking in Delta County one year before.
The third quarter started with each team scoring a touchdown, including Terry nabbing his second TD, to alter Marquette’s two-touchdown lead to 21–7. Knowing that Escanaba had proven they could score at a quick pace, hometown fans were excited but seemed to remain skeptical while the deficit sat within a couple touchdowns. In search of a bit more cushion, a methodical mid-quarter Marquette drive ended with Mitchell Crothers converting on a 33-yard field goal to widen the MSHS lead to 24–7.
In the fourth quarter, Marquette’s defense shined. Their ability to manufacture turnovers, including a pair of interceptions by Terry and Forsberg, put the game away and sealed one of the biggest upsets of the season. The ending score was 24–7, a massive swing toward MSHS from the 73-point shutout in 2009. Offensively, the MSHS aerial attack had a night. Terry solidified himself as one of the UP’s biggest playmakers on both sides of the ball with 3 catches for 82 yards and 2 TDs in addition to a pick. Emmendorfer also broke out, showing that Marquette could be two-dimensional on offense by going 10–12 for 161 yards passing and 3 TDs. Like Terry, Forsberg proved to be a difference-maker on both offense and defense with 2 catches, 36 yards, and a touchdown to go along with his late-game interception. As a bonus, Crothers showed that Marquette had a reliable kicker — a rarity for high school football.
This momentous win served as proof of how much can change in a single season, awakening the entire Upper Peninsula athletic scene to an undeniable fact: something was happening at MSHS. For the first time since 1988, the school was on a three-game win streak. With three consecutive road games on the horizon to wrap up the GNC season, the stage was set to compete for the school’s first conference title since 1976. Even an elusive berth in the MHSAA playoffs was becoming a possibility, a nearly unattainable realm for modern Marquette football. Next week, the first of three straight road games against the rest of the Great Northern Conference: at Gladstone, at Kingsford, and at Menominee.
