High school football: American Fork handles West easily on the road

SALT LAKE CITY – The American Fork Cavemen took a short trip to the big city Friday, and everything on the football field seemed to go perfectly.

Dylan Story threw for 301 yards and five touchdowns and Jacob Early rushed for 124 yards to help the Cavemen blow out the West Panthers 45-21 in a nonregion match of possible championship contenders.

American Fork improved to 3-0 overall and never let this game out of its grasp. The Cavemen scored on their first two drives, limited their mistakes and kept West quarterback Isaiah SueSue from making many big plays.

The visitors led 24-14 at halftime and then came out of the locker room and dominated more while dealing a blow to West, which fell to 0-2.

“It was fairly close to how we wanted to draw it up,” said American Fork coach Aaron Behm, whose team has reached the playoff quarterfinals the last three seasons after losing in the championship games in 2018 and 2019.

“This was a really good effort for four quarters against a really good football team. It was a good win because we know what we have (on the schedule) ahead of us.”

The Cavemen are building momentum before the Region 3 season starts in three weeks and, while they don’t want to peak too early, they aren’t going to complain about their undefeated record and the offense’s 37 points per game average.

Story was on target Friday, and only a second-quarter interception that Aisea Angilau returned 32 yards for a score put a damper on his night.

He had two touchdown throws to Davis Andrews and one each to Dax Watts, Josh Andrus and Jett Nelson.

With Early also having success breaking through the West line, the Cavemen were frequently unstoppable.

Each time West scored, the Cavemen retaliated with another touchdown drive. The lead was 45-14 before SueSue connected with Chachi Pan on a 63-yard scoring pass.

By that time, Story was quietly celebrating on the sidelines.

“Our offensive line played lights out, and I have some great receivers,” Story said. “We had a good game plan and they really didn’t stop us when we needed points.”

Behm was particularly proud of American Fork’s 11-play drive to start the game that culminated when Story found Watts on a short scoring pass.

After West was forced to punt when SueSue was sacked on a third-down play, the Cavemen roared downfield again and Story found Andrews on a 30-yard throw.

It was 14-0 before the stadium lights were even turned on.

“We knew they had come back from a big deficit the week before, so we had stay tough,” said Behm.

The American Fork defense also had its share of heroes, forcing the athletic SueSue to stay in the pocket most of the time.

SueSue also didn’t find many open receivers and completed just 9 of 31 passes and had two interceptions. Most of his 156 yards came on two completions, and American Fork’s linebackers didn’t gamble and stayed close to the line of scrimmage to limit his running effectiveness.

West, which fell to American Fork 20-13 last season before running off seven straight wins, will try to recover when it plays at Olympus next week.

The Cavemen, meanwhile, have a long road trip to Rigby, Idaho.