Staff photo by Travis Rosenau Springfield’s Paytin Johnson lays out in an attempt to score a touchdown in the first half of Saturday’s Section 3A semifinals football game against Sleepy Eye United at Riverside Park in Springfield.

SPRINGFIELD — The Springfield Tigers know they’re expected to throw the ball and throw it often.

When the top-seeded Tigers started Saturday afternoon’s game with a handoff to Paytin Johnson that he took 71 yards for a score, all bets were off.

Behind a quick and steady run game and a stifling defense, the Tigers were able to shut out fifth-seeded Sleepy Eye United 43-0 in a Section 3A Football Tournament semifinals game at Riverside Park.

Johnson finished the game with 14 carries for 209 yards and that big first-play TD.

“It’s just big in all aspects,” Johnson said of his big TD run. “It starts with the linemen, I want to congratulate them, they’re my leaders and I follow them. But it’s big just in general, it builds the linemen’s confidence, it opens up the pass game. It just creates this entire new offense is what it feels like once you get that run game going.

“People are expecting, ‘This team passes first, they lead the state in this and that,’ and just breaking away with a 70-yard run, it kind of catches them off guard and it gives everybody a little bit of confidence on our side of the ball and it gets the juices going right away.”

The Tigers (9-0) move on to the Section 3A championship game for the fourth year in a row and will play No. 2 Murray County Central at 12:30 p.m. Halloween Friday at Southwest Minnesota State University.

SEU ends the season 4-6.

Tigers QB Parker Kuehn still got his throws in, just fewer than usual as he completed 11 of 20 passes for 140 yards, three TDs and one interception. Isaac Fredin caught five of those passes for 45 yards, while Madden lendt had three catches for 39 yards and a TD and Braxton Brown had two catches for 45 yards and a score.

Things didn’t get much better for SEU after giving up that big play to Johnson as they were forced into a three-and-out on their first drive. The Tigers took the ball back and got another long run by Johnson to help put them into SEU territory.

A few plays later, Kuehn found Lendt for a 17-yard TD and 15-0 lead after Lendt’s PAT kick.

The Tigers didn’t intend to go for 2 after Johnson’s opening TD, but it turned into 2 when a bad spot was flipped to Lendt, who then threw it Colten Sell for 2 and an 8-0 lead. Lendt ended up finishing the game by making all five of his PAT kicks.

“Having the balance that we had today is so important, against any team, but especially come playoff time,” Tigers head coach Adam Meyer said. “You know you need to do both and if you’re one-dimensional, it’s really tough to advance.”

SEU quarterback Brayden Heiderscheidt completed 2 of 4 passes for 13 yards, both to Carson Uecker, and threw one interception. Keeyan Netkze handled the ground game for SEU with 18 carries for 53 yards, while Merrick Mathiowetz added six carries for 26 yards.

The rest of the first quarter was scoreless and the Tigers found the end zone again midway through the second on a fourth-and-1 keeper by Kuehn to the outside, making it a 22-0 game, which ended up being the score at halftime after a late Tigers drive was halted in the red zone after an interception by Adam Steffensmeier, who finished the game with two picks.

Tyson Horkey had a big game on defense for the Tigers as he finished with two sacks and a forced fumble. The forced fumble came on SEU’s first drive of the second half but was recovered by SEU. That still forced a punt and the Tigers went back to work on their first drive of the second half, ending the drive with a 10-yard TD catch by Fredin for a 29-0 lead.

After a sack by Horkey on fourth down turned it over on downs, the Tigers made it 36-0 on one sideline throw to Brown for 33 yards.

SEU, who was unable to get it into the red zone in the first half, finally found the red zone late in the third quarter thanks to a strong run from Keeyan Netzke and a roughing penalty. Still, the Tigers defense remained strong and ended up getting an interception by Lendt at the 5 to stop the run.

SEU got back into the red zone in the fourth after a blocked punt by Nick Tauer, who finished with seven tackles, that was recovered by Gavin Strong. Still, the Tigers didn’t allow SEU to capitalize. Lendt finished with another interception moments later after pressure by Horkey forced a throw to the end zone into the hands of Lendt.

The Tigers got their final touchdown with 3:11 left to play on a 3-yard run by Aiden Moriarty.

“Just like on offense, defensively it’s all about the front first,” Meyer said. “If those guys are handling their business, that make’s everybody’s job easier. Tyson was excellent all day. His effort throughout the season has just been tremendous and a value for our team and then obviously, Aiden, playing him multiple spots. Coach [Brandon] Wilhelmi’s done a great job of moving him from linebacker to tackle to end, makes it hard to get a pulse on where he’s at exactly. With a talent like that, you want to move him, and he’s an answer to a lot of problems.

“But overall, I thought our defense was excellent all game. Everybody works together and when the guys do their jobs, it’s pretty tough on that side.”

Cole Paplow also forced a fumble for the Tigers, while Sell and Isaac Lopez-Rangel recovered fumbles.