Slow start plagues Newton football in loss to No. 2 Pella

PELLA — The Newton football team rushed for 246 yards and had more first downs than rival Pella on Friday. But a slow start and three turnovers plagued the Cardinals during a 35-28 road loss at Central College.

Class 4A No. 8 Newton fell behind the 4A District 4 contest 27-7 at halftime and couldn’t quite recover.

The victory puts the Dutch in the driver’s seat for a home playoff game. The Cardinals will focus on finishing the season with a trio of victories.

“We have to control what we can control. The only thing we can control is winning the last three games,” Newton head football coach Andy Swedenhjelm said. “The focus now is on beating Carlisle. That’s what we have to do. Our kids should feel good about that, but if we look too far into the future, we can get tripped up a long the way. I know the Gilbert game looms large to a lot of people, but we have to beat Carlisle first.”

Newton struggled to move the ball through the air in the first half, while Pella’s Tyson Barnes grabbed three TD passes from Colin Kerndt to give the Dutch a 20-point advantage at halftime.

The Cardinals had a 20-16 surplus in first downs, but Newton was only 4-of-12 on third down and 1-of-4 on fourth down.

Newton (4-2, 1-1 in the district) went for it twice on fourth down on its first drive of the game. The Cardinals came up short on their second attempt.

They also went for it on fourth down and 6 from their own 26-yard line late in the second quarter. Pella (6-0, 2-0) made the defensive stop and Barnes hauled in his third TD of the half a few plays later to make it 27-7 with 36 seconds on the clock.

“That one bites. That’s a situation where we’re down two scores and they get the ball to start the second half, and we could build a little bit of momentum there,” Swedenhjelm said. “That was our mindset. We wanted to try to make something out of that drive.

“I’d probably do that differently if I had to do it over again, but we all live and learn. We’re aggressive on fourth down, it’s what we do. To the chagrin of many people I’m sure. But that’s OK. That’s what we do. We had confidence in ourselves, and it’s a great learning experience.”

Barnes grabbed a 49-yard TD in the first to extend the Dutch’s lead to 13-0.

Qhjuan Coley had his best game as a Cardinal so far. He ran for a career-high 106 yards on 18 carries. His first rushing TD of the night came with 7:04 to go in the half.

“The beauty of our system is that it can be anyone’s night on any given night,” Swedenhjelm said. “We weren’t reading our keys early, but we had more success late in the game. We need to have more trust in what we do. He’s a great player. A great athlete. And he grew up a lot tonight.”

The Dutch defense intercepted Caden Klein twice in the first half and then forced a fumble in the third quarter on a possession that saw Newton drive deep into Pella territory.

Klein finished 9-of-24 through the air for 94 yards, one touchdown and two picks. He rushed for 81 yards on 11 carries.

Skyler Milheiser led the pass catchers with four catches for 34 yards. Reilly Trease added two catches for 18 yards, Finn Martin grabbed one pass for 19 yards and Coley snagged two passes for 23 yards and one TD.

“We thought we had some stuff in the passing game,” Swedenhjelm said. “We kind of pressed a little bit. We weren’t making the correct reads. We expected more one-on-one coverage, but they bracketed (Martin). We locked into (Martin) too much early probably.”

Coley’s receiving TD was from 17 yards out with 2:56 to go in the game. It trimmed Pella’s lead to seven.

“Our kids have a lot of heart. They do a lot of things right on and off the field. There effort was never in doubt,” Swedenhjelm said about the second-half comeback. “A lot of the first half we were too tight and tried to press too much. We tried to do things above and beyond what they had to do to be successful. We talked at halftime about going back to our fundamentals and trusting what we do.”

Newton’s defense forced Pella into a third and long after the touchdown, but Barnes came through again with a game-sealing catch along the home team’s sideline with about a minute and a half to play in the game.

He finished with 10 catches for 168 yards and three scores. Kerndt threw for 220 yards and three touchdowns and rushed for 74 yards and two scores on 19 carries.

“Tyson Barnes is a returning all-state guy,” Swedenhjelm said. “They do a good job of getting him isolated. He’s 6-foot-4, and our corners aren’t the tallest dudes in the world. We had to make adjustments to that. We went back to our base and away from some of the specialty stuff we put in. We just did what we do best in the second half.”

Milheiser rushed for 19 yards on three carries, Trease gained 19 yards on two carries and Christian Ergenbright gained 92 yards on three kickoff returns.

The Cardinals were out-gained 339-331 and averaged 5.7 yards per carry. They lost the turnover battle, 3-1.

Nick Milburn led the Newton defense with nine tackles and one sack. Damien Smith tallied 8.5 tackles, Derek Wermager added a career-best eight tackles and Peyton Rozendaal finished with 5.5 tackles.

Colton Northcutt contributed 4.5 tackles, Lincoln Peterson had four tackles and Dawson Maki registered 3.5 tackles. Klein intercepted Kerndt in the first half and posted 4.5 tackles.

Emmanuel Diers rushed for 49 yards on 13 carries and grabbed six passes for 49 yards for the Dutch. Kyler VanMaanen led the defense with 10 tackles, while Nate Warner finished with nine tackles and two tackles for loss.

Notes: The Cardinals came into the game winners of two straight against their rivals, but the Dutch are now 8-3 against Newton since 2010. “I love the effort, the intensity and their heart. That’s awesome and it’s what championship teams do,” Swedenhjelm said. “But we have to trust that we are good enough the way we are. You don’t have to be superman.” … The loss could be detrimental in getting a home playoff game later this season. Pella and Gilbert are currently both unbeaten and ranked with Newton in the top 10 of 4A. The Cardinals finish the regular season at home against Carlisle on Friday, at Gilbert on Oct. 18 and at home against Des Moines Hoover on Oct. 25.