Local Sports

Knights hold off Polars after hot start

Turriff sets MLC passing yards record

NEW ULM -- Martin Luther College outscored Crown College 27-0 in the first quarter of an Upper Midwest Athletic Conference football game on Saturday, a deficit too much for the Polars to overcome despite a strong effort as the Knights won 37-29.

"When a team catches momentum, it's hard to stop," MLC quarterback Brady Turriff said. "When you can keep that momentum, it's a special thing. But we've got to be able to keep that momentum for the rest of the game. We only scored 10 points for the rest of the game. That's not what we want. Great first quarter, but we've got to be able to maintain that and limit our mistakes."

Turriff surpassed a MLC record during the game, passing Ben Kuerth's mark of 5,876 for most career passing yards for the Knights.

"It's great," Turriff said. "It's a good feeling to be recognized. At the end of the day, it’s the receivers that should get the credit. The O-line men, and guys made plays today. I've had great receivers over the years, and it's a blessing to throw them the ball every game. It's great, but we're focused on the next week."

Turriff had 354 yards and four touchdowns on 22 completions in the game, while Arthur Robinson had 77 yards and a touchdown on 26 rushes. Noah Huebner had 11 receptions for 177 yards and three touchdowns, and Ben Vasold had seven receptions for 95 yards. Treyton Heyn had a catch for 65 yards and a touchdown. Defensively, Nathan Schmidt had six tackles, four for a loss, and a sack, while Ethan Melso had five tackles and an interception. William Stuebs and Carter Bilitz each had a sack.

Turriff connected with Heyn on the first play from scrimmage in the game for a 65-yard touchdown. Crown's Rudy Gonzales fumbled the ball right back to the Knights, recovered by Jonah Mittelstadt, on the Polars' first play from scrimmage, and MLC capitalized with a 8-yard passing touchdown from Turriff to Huebner for a 13-0 MLC lead. Crown turned it over on downs, and while MLC was forced to punt it after a three-and-out, the Knights defense forced a three-and-out of its own, and this time Turriff hit Huebner for a 5-yard touchdown for a 20-0 lead. Crown punted it back, and while MLC stalled again, this time Crown muffed the punt return, with Bilitz recovering to give the Knights the ball at the Crown 6-yard line. From there, Robinson punched it in to give the Knights their 27-0 first-quarter lead.

MLC tacked on a field goal by Gabriel Nottling in the second quarter for a 30-0 advantage before Crown scored its first points of the game on a 26-yard pass from Zach Brown to Michael Sarych before halftime.

Needing to fight against a 30-7 lead, Brown threw another touchdown pass, this time 30 yards to Jakhari Jones, to cut the lead to 30-13. Turriff found Huebner for his third touchdown of the day as Huebner broke a tackle on his way to the endzone to make it a 27-13 game. Brown ran it in from 21 yards out to cut the lead down to 37-21 as time wound down in the third quarter.

The teams traded possessions without scores before Isaiah Legate caught a 31-yard touchdown pass from Brown, with Rox Reiman running in the 2-point conversion to make it an 8-point game. But the MLC defense came up huge, with Joseph Dahlberg hitting Brown as he thew as the pass ended up in the arms of Melso for an interception. The Knights took off three Crown timeouts but missed a field goal to put the game away. Still, Schmidt and Stuebs came up with big sacks in the final drive of the game as the Polars turned it over on downs.

"The defense came up big," Turriff said. "We failed to get some points in the fourth quarter, but the defense got a pick, got a turnover on downs. They stepped up big time in that fourth quarter for sure."

MLC (2-5) hosts Westminster College on Saturday at 12 p.m.