Loggers fall to Ronan Chiefs, 69-13

A week after losing 43-0 to the Fairfield Eagles, the Libby Loggers football team showed improvements in their second game of the season against the Ronan Chiefs.

Despite the improvements the Loggers fell to the Chiefs 69-13.

“The final score doesn’t indicate it, but we played a much better game this week compared to the first week,” head coach Neil Fuller said. “I was thrilled with our performance. It was a big improvement from the week before. Ronan is a very good football team. I think we matched up a lot better with them physically then we did against Fairfield.”

The Loggers started the game defensively and forced the Chiefs offense to go three and out. On the ensuing punt the Loggers recovered the botched snap exchange inside the Chiefs 10-yard line.

On the next play the Loggers scored their first touchdown of the season on a passing touchdown from Brian Peck to Dom Voorhies.

It was the only lead the Loggers would hold as the Chiefs scored 30 unanswered and held a 49-13 lead at halftime.

 If it weren’t for a number of mistakes from the Loggers the game could have been more competitive in the second half.

“What hurt us was the goofy mistakes,” Fuller said. “If we can eliminate some of those self inflicted gun shot wounds we would have been in great shape. Just watching the film we dropped some balls that could have led to big plays. On one bad snap on a punt we didn’t cover up in the end zone to take a safety and they jumped on the ball to get a touchdown. Ronan is a good football team. They just about beat Bigfork the week before. The kids showed that they can play and compete. We’re just not strong enough to overcome those silly mistakes. You can never eliminate all the mistakes, but we need to limit them. I was proud of our kids. We competed and battled against a very good team. We shot ourselves in the foot. We gave up a couple big plays, but they got a lot of there scoring off the mistakes we made. We just need to focus on limiting our mistakes.”

Fuller said his team will focus on the quarterback and center exchange this week in practice after struggling with the exchange Friday night.

“We had an uncharacteristic amount of snaps hit the dirt,” he said. “It’s just hard to get a rhythm with that happening. If we had a physical offensive line it would be one thing, but we can’t afford to be snapping the ball low to our quarterbacks. If you are constantly having to bend over and pick up the snap it screws up the timing of the play.”

The Chiefs had a defensive tackle that was quick and physical. Fuller said he was a factor in his young centers struggling with the snap.

“I think our centers were concerned about the speed of the player Ronan had in the A gap,” he said. “I think that was a distraction for them. Both of them are sophomores and it was a good learning experience for them. We will work on that this week.”

In their first game against the Eagles the Loggers quarterback was under constant pressure. Fuller said he was pleased with the overall play from the offensive line against the Chiefs on Friday.

“I was really proud of how we improved up front,” he said. “We were able to execute most of our offense. We passed the ball effectively and we were able to have some good runs.”

Freshman running back Cole Walker was a bright spot offensively. He ran hard and finished the night with 50 yards on nine carries.

“Cole is very talented,” Fuller said. “He just had a habit of heading to the sideline and trying to outrun everybody around the corner. We have been working with him on that. He made some great cuts and ran through some tackles and really showed what he’s capable of. Hopefully he can build on that and get some confidence from that. He certainly has a lot of talent and we’re excited about that.”

Next up for the Loggers is a road game against Priest River. Fuller said it will be a good test for his young team to play their first road game of the season.

“This is a young team and there will be growing pains this year,” he said. “We just need to be patient and improve each week. I expect our kids to come out this week and take a step forward. We came out and did some good things this last week. We just need to get the mental toughness to play through some mistakes. If we can move the ball more consistently and cut down on our mental mistakes we will be OK.”