Arlington quarterback Logan Kaup lingered behind as his football team left its home field Friday night.
After a three-interception night against Class C1 No. 2 Ashland-Greenwood, the 38-0 victors, the senior had a brief one-on-one meeting with his head coach under the lights.
“This is behind us now. You've got to worry about the future and what's coming down the road,” Eagles coach Colter Mattson said after his two-way, standout player headed back to the locker room. “If we sit here and dwell on the little things that happened in this game, we're never going to get better. We're always going to be working backwards. That's what I told him.”
The 38-point loss wasn't what AHS had hoped for after a 2-0 start to the season, so they're moving on.
“It's a new week,” Mattson said.
The Eagles and Ashland-Greenwood battled through a scoreless first quarter before the Bluejays finally broke through during the second on a 16-yard Drake Zimmerman run. Five minutes later, Ashland's Nathan Upton added a 15-yarder with 1:18 left in the first half.
The 14-0 lead stood through the intermission, but grew throughout the third quarter and during the early stages of the fourth.
“They leaned on us,” Mattson said after the opposition ran for 295 yards. “They're coached really well. It's obvious they know what their strengths are and they do it really well.”
AHS forced two fumbles and limited the Bluejays to short runs during the first half, but its success didn't last.
“We were putting guys in the spots to shut the play down — or, we thought we were,” Mattson said. “And they were better tonight.”
Ashland scored three touchdowns and a field goal during the second half. Two of the scores came on 54- and 62-yard runs.
Arlington, meanwhile, struggled to make big offensive plays throughout. It totaled just 139 yards with Isaac Foust running for a team-high 31 on seven carries. Back Frankie Rosenbalm managed just 19 on 14 carries, though he did catch two passes for 45 yards as well.
Arguably the Eagles' top highlight against Ashland was a second-quarter pass from Kaup to Rosenbalm. Trailing 7-0, Kaup took the snap and moved to his right alongside his blockers and all but one of the Eagles' eligible receivers. The one who didn't go right was Rosenbalm, who left the backfield and ran to the south sideline — his left.
After taking a couple of steps to the north with the ball, Kaup stopped, turned and looked to his senior classmate, throwing the ball to the wide-open Eagle for 37 yards. It was highlight, but AHS still fell by 38 points against the state's second-ranked team according to the Omaha World-Herald's ratings.
Still, the Eagles are 2-1 and have a second opportunity to pull off an upset against a top opponent. Arlington plays at No. 1 Pierce on Friday.
“We've been in worse spots than this,” Mattson said after the Ashland loss, taking the same route off of the field as his QB had.
