Maple Grove football makes fewer mistakes, beats Minnetonka

The Crimson earn a top-5 victory entering the Class 6A playoffs

The No. 10 Maple Grove Crimson (6-2) defeated the No. 5 Minnetonka Skippers (6-2) 27-13 Thursday at Maple Grove High School. 

It wasn’t pretty, but it didn’t have to be, as Maple Grove used two backwards passes to complete two long touchdown passed in the second half to pull away from the Minnetonka Skippers.

Henry Stang caught the first of the trick plays on Maple Grove’s first play from scrimmage in the second half, going 65 yards for the touchdown. 

He caught the second on the first play of the Crimson’s second drive of the second half, making it 20-6 with seven minutes, 30 seconds remaining in the third quarter. 

Minnetonka scored a touchdown from Lucas Knox to pull within seven, but the Skippers struggled to move the ball the rest of the game. 

The two teams traded turnovers twice in the first half.

Maple Grove sophomore Brayden Dozier intercepted Skippers’ quarterback Andrew Simonsen to end a promising Minnetonka drive in the second quarter. But a Crimson fumble gave it right back to the Skippers. Early in the third quarter, Minnetonka fumbled to Maple Grove, and on the very next play, the Crimson coughed it up to the Skippers.

The Skippers tied it up with 5:44 left in the first half thanks to a long run by Chase Conrad, after which they scored from one yard out to make it 6-6.

That’s where the score remained after two quarters played. Then the Crimson broke out the trick plays.

“The two trick plays definitely tossed the momentum,” he said. “Too many mistakes on our part, though.”

After Minnetonka’s kickoff out of bounds to start the second half, Crimson quarterback Kaden Harney connected with Dylan Vokal on a backwards pass, and Vokal tossed a long pass to Stang for the 65-yard touchdown to make it 13-6. The Crimson opened their next drive with the very same play and got the very same result, making it 20-6.

“We realized their corners really like to bite, so if I just faked for a second and win they weren’t going to be there,” Stang said. “So it helped that we scouted them a lot.”

Knox added a two-yard touchdown for the Skippers to make it 20-13 with 10 minutes to play, but it was too little too late. Maple Grove answered, as junior Bo Draheim received a pass and ran away from Minnetonka defenders to make it 27-13 with 5:30 to go.

“We’re still going to be the two-seed,” Esch said of his Skippers. “A little humble pie doesn’t taste too good, but we’ll be better for it.”

The Skippers finished the regular season 6-2 overall, and 4-1 in the Metro West. With the win, Maple Grove finishes 6-2 overall and 5-2 in the Metro North, tied for second with Anoka (5-2).

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-- Jack Butler | butler@scorebooklive.com | @sblivemn