High school football: Idaho's Emmett runs wild in win over Tokay
Sep. 24—The Emmett High football team rode 10 hours from Idaho to Lodi on Friday, and stepped off the bus ready to play some football.
Their host, Tokay High, was not quite as ready to play as Emmett ran away with a 48-20 victory at Tokay's Hubbard Field.
"Their enrollment's 2,100, so I was just looking at it on paper from a standpoint of 2,100 vs. 700, holy cow, that's some heavy lifting," said Emmett coach Rich Hargitt. "So I just preached to our guys, you know, you're playing a school triple your enrollment, long bus ride, gotta leave and play in the same day, there's a lot of stuff going against you, and if you don't come to play, you're going to get run off the field. And the kids took it to heart."
Emmett quarterback Dakota Perry and receiver Stevie Howe connected for five touchdown passes in the rout. Perry also scored on a quarterback sneak, and Howe snagged an interception on defense.
Hargitt said this is the first season starting for both of them.
"They've been doing that all summer. We went through our summer 7-on-7 season undefeated," Hargitt said. "...He had 16 TDs coming into the game, I think he was No. 1 in the state. So that connection between those two has been very good for us, and we felt like if we could do it again tonight, we could put Tokay in a bit of a problem where they'd have to take people out of the box, and then we could run the football. It's basically one of those nights where everything works."
Tokay was on its heels from the start, allowing a 54-yard Perry-to-Howe pass and a 16-yard pass, with an interception by Emmett lineman Hunter Enick sandwiched between the two drives. Tokay got on the board with a 2-yard dive by quarterback Zack Filippini, and then Emmett went back to work in the second quarter with Perry's QB sneak, a 21-yard Perry-to-Howe pass, and a 45-yard Perry-to-Howe pass. With another Filippini run, Tokay trailed 33-13 at halftime.
In that first half, Perry and Howe connected five times for 172 yards. Perry finished the game with 10-of-13 passing for 231 yards, with 7 of those passes to Howe for 205 yards.
"We couldn't get stops. Especially when we went in at halftime, the message was, it's a 20-point game. That's three touchdowns, and three extra points, and we're back in this," said Tokay coach Collin Rhoads. "Defense, we need stops the rest of the game. Offense, we need three touchdowns. And clearly that didn't happen. Our effort just wasn't there tonight. It was like we were a different team on the field tonight."
The second half was a slower affair. Emmett began with a long drive down the field for the last of the five Perry-Howe touchdowns. After a Tokay drive stalled, with the Tigers already abandoning the punt to go for it on fourth down, Emmett mounted another drive, this time focused on running back Ry Fullerton, who finished with 24 carries for 152 yards.
After a long Tokay drive, the final score of the night came from Filippini, a jaunt into the end zone from a yard out for his third of the night. Gabriela Gonzales' extra point was the final play of the game, with a running clock in the fourth quarter.
The ground game was one of the few positives the Tigers (3-2) could take from the game as Tri-City Athletic League play looms with a matchup against West next Friday. Tokay's Barrett Crosby finished with 81 yards on 15 carries.
"Yeah, I felt like we did a decent job running the rock. We had opportunities, we had plays that were working for us, but we're not good enough to make mistake after mistake, and a dropped pass is an opportunity missed," Rhoads said. "We need to execute a whole lot better, and they know that. The team is disappointed in themselves. And that's good going into next week."
Emmett (4-1) won its 4A Southern Idaho Conference opener last Friday, and gets back into league action next Friday against Columbia High from Nampa, Id. But before leaving town, the Huskies had to experience a little bit of California, with the entire team treated to In-N-Out Burger after the game.
"I've been to California several times, but a lot of our kids, this is their first time. So our quarterback and No. 7 (Joe Lummus) are both California kids, 7's from Orange County, and the quarterback is from the Sacramento area," Hargitt said. "We were going to get pizza, but then the pizza place closed, and they're like oh man, please let the kids get In-N-Out, Coach. It's like they're being treated to a royal feast. They're fired up."
