Staff photo by Travis Rosenau Minnesota Valley Lutheran’s Kyan Kube and Ethan Doering (24) sack Pipestone Area quarterback Landon Quist in the second half of Friday night’s South District, Central-Silver Subdistrict football game at Johnson Field in New Ulm.

NEW ULM — Defense kept the Minnesota Valley Lutheran Chargers in Friday night’s South District, Central-Silver Subdistrict football game with the Pipestone Area Arrows, but it was the Arrows’ defense making one more play in the end for a 34-28 win at Johnson Field.

The Chargers forced four Pipestone turnovers in the game, with their last takeaway being a fumble recovery by Kyan Kube with less than four minutes to play and down 34-28.

After a few runs put the Chargers up at the Arrows 43, Chargers quarterback Kaden Peterson threw a long pass up the middle that was pulled out of the air by Tagon Woelber for an interception at the 19. Pipestone was able to run the clock down and force MVL to use its remaining two timeouts before punting with 13 seconds left.

The Chargers had six seconds on the clock to make a play and after Peterson scrambled left and heaved the ball to the end zone, the Pipestone defense batted the ball away inside the 5 to escape Johnson Field with its perfect record in tact as it moved to 5-0 on the year.

In addition to Kube’s fumble recovery, the Chargers also got a fumble recovery by Ethan Johnson and an interception apiece from Connor Bode and Eric Sorensen.

“The effort is there, that’s why it’s hurting for the guys tonight,” MVL head coach Jim Buboltz said. “They put their heart into it, they brought a big effort tonight, just came up short. I don’t think it’s the end of the game, I think it’s the one right before half that was really the dagger. Tough for us to come back, but we won the second half. Every punch they threw in the second half we countered back with more and just ran out of time in the end.”

Arrows 6-foot-5 quarterback Landon Quist accounted for all of his team’s touchdowns in the game, with four touchdown passes and one touchdown run.

The Chargers got on the board first in the opening quarter after Johnson recovered a fumble at the Arrows 17. Bode then steamrolled a defender down the right sideline on a run for 17 yards and a touchdown. Trace Gunderson’s extra-point kick was good for a 7-0 lead.

The Arrows got a 41-yard touchdown catch and run by Austin Musch later in the first quarter, however, before a 65-yard touchdown reception by Cayden Zephier on a screen pass put the Arrows up 14-7. Pipestone was able to go up 21-7 just before the half after a couple of long catch and runs finished with a 21-yard touchdown reception by Woelber as time expired in the first half.

Bode gave the MVL defense some confidence back with a long interception return to the Arrows 11-yard line, which ended up allowing Peterson to find Ethan Schauland open for a 3-yard TD pass before a Gunderson extra point made it 21-14. After a scoreless drive by both teams, Pipestone went up 28-14 after another TD catch by Zephier, this time for 12 yards, late in the third quarter.

On the next MVL drive, Bode had a solid run of 33 yards to set MVL up at the Pipestone 15. A few plays later, Peterson took it himself for a 1-yard run with 37 seconds left in the third. The extra point attempt was blocked, however, making it 28-20.

Quist continued to air it out for Pipestone to move the chains, with one throw going 38 yards to Musch. Quist eventually got his team and football to the goal line and reached over the pile for a 1-yard TD run with 9:45 left to play.

The Chargers ran the ball well after that, which set up Peterson finding Sorensen to his right in the end zone for a 19-yard touchdown pass. Sorensen then caught a 2-point conversion throw from Peterson to have MVL down 34-28.

Before Kube’s fumble recovery, the Chargers forced three consecutive Pipestone incompletions in the final six minutes to force a punt. MVL turned it back over on downs, however, after a sack on fourth down. Pipestone then fumbled on second down to set up the dramatic final three minutes of play.

Bode finished leading the Chargers on the ground with 148 yards rushing on 20 carries, while Ben Price had 13 carries for 41 yards and Peterson had seven carries for 31 yards. Peterson completed 7 of 21 passes for 61 yards.

Hunter led the MVL defense with eight tackles, while Price added a sack.

“They all ran the ball real well tonight at different times and it gave us the opportunity to stay in the game,” Buboltz said. “We tried not to get away from the run, we tried to stick with it as long as we could, we just just ran out of time at the end. Big hats off to our defense in the second half here, only giving up a couple of plays in the second half, I thought they really, really played well and we were so close to some big opportunities, but it’s too bad. I’m proud of the steps we made. If we keep making strides like this, we’re going to be OK the next couple weeks.”

MVL (2-3) is at Jackson County Central next for a 2 p.m. Saturday matchup on Oct. 5.