As the old axiom goes, “It ain’t over ‘til the fat lady sings.”
Enumclaw High’s gridders stunned the No. 1 3A squad in the state, the Lakes Lancers, Friday evening by going ahead 14-7 at intermission in the friendly confines of Harry Lang Stadium.
The fat lady, for a time, was no where to be seen. But when she finally arrived, she sang like a canary.
Lakes came roaring back in the second half to score four unanswered touchdowns and claim the 35-14 conquest. The win made Lakes’ record an untarnished 4-0 in league on the season. Enumclaw is 2-1 in league action and 3-1 overall.
“This is the first time we’ve faced any adversity this year,” Lakes coach Dave Miller said. “The Hornets gave us a wake up call.”
It’s a good thing for the Lancers that they were able to drag themselves off the canvas to answer the bell in the second half, because judging from the Hornets’ play in the first two stanzas, Enumclaw wanted the victory badly.
Early in the second quarter Lakes had the ball at midfield and was in a fourth-and-seven predicament and chose not to punt. Enumclaw stuffed the ensuing running play for a 2-yard loss and took over possession at the Lancer 46-yard line.
The Enumclaw offense was able to capitalize as moments later EHS signal caller Riley Carel tossed his first of two touchdown strikes when he lofted a 36-yard aerial to junior wideout Terenn Houk.
Andy Holdener pumped the extra-point kick through the uprights and the score was knotted at seven.
Enumclaw was able to hit the jackpot again. With a fourth-and-down-and-five situation on Lakes’ 13-yard line and with less tan a minute left in the half, it looked as if Enumclaw was going to have to settle for a field goal try. The Lancers jumped offsides however and furnished Enumclaw with another set of downs.
Running against the stellar Lakes defense proved futile after the first quarter, so Enumclaw elected to go for it through the air. On a third and goal-to-go Lakes blundered again as one of its defensive backs shoved Houk when the pass was in midair to draw a pass interference call.
On first down with the ball on the 4-yard line, Houk caught a dart from Carel for the last EHS touchdown of the contest. Holdener tacked on the extra point as the last few seconds of the scoreboard clock ticked away and the Hornets held the 14-7 upperhand at intermission.
“I told the guys in the half time locker room, don’t even think that this game is over,” Hornet coach Don Bartel said, “because they are going to be coming after you in the second half.”
Bartel’s words were correct. The vaunted Lakes running game kicked into high gear and all the time that Carel had to throw early in the game dissolved into him running for his life and frantically trying to spot an open target. The Lakes defense blitzed liberally, several times flushing Carel out of his comfort zone in the pocket and simply did a better job of blanketing the Hornet receivers.
Enumclaw returns to Harry Lang Stadium Friday to engage in battle with the Warriors of Clover Park High School. The Warriors are 0-3 in league action and are 0-4 overall, with their most recent thrashing coming Friday in the form of a 56-7 pummeling at the hands of the Peninsula Seahawks.
