Two weeks after it started, the Big Sandy Pioneers football regular season is halfway done.
In yet another 2020 oddity, the home slate is two-thirds complete following Friday’s 68-13 romp over Bear Paw country rival Box Elder.
Fourteen days after the season kicked off, Big Sandy improved to 3-0 and faces two of its last three scheduled contests on the road before a likely fourth consecutive trip to the state playoffs.
The Pioneers’ dominance against their guests from just 10 miles north became evident from the opening drive.
Brady Pleninger forced a Bears fumble on the third snap and Dillin Geyer swooped in to recover. On the Pioneers’ first play from scrimmage, Kade Strutz rolled left and tossed a 20-yard pass across the middle to Cam Schwarzbach for a 6-0 edge less than 2 minutes into the contest.
“His first read is run,” Big Sandy coach Larry Jappe said of Strutz, who has thrown a fair amount of passes in the first three games. “They’re just turning everything into a TD.”
Strutz accounted for the second score on the ground, bowling over several hopeful tacklers from 17 yards out and diving into the pylon for six. Parker Proulx dashed in from 7 yards out as the clock hit 0:00 to end the first quarter with Big Sandy up 21-0. A beautiful fingertips-only pass catch with outstretched arms by Proulx on the previous play set up the score.
Sophomores Kody Strutz and Lance Rutledge connected on a 5-yard pass 2 minutes into quarter No. 2 to stretch the lead and senior Proulx stepped over several shoestring tackle attempts to make it 37-0 at the 5:59 mark. That set the clock running by the mercy rule and permitted Big Sandy starters to give way to the second and third strings for the remainder of the game.
The reserves did not disappoint.
Freshman Wylee Snapp caught a 4-yard dump from sophomore Braydon Cline for the 43-0 halftime tally.
Freshman speedster Cooper Taylor returned the first of three kickoffs for TDs, adding up to 213 yards between them, to begin the second half.
His wheels caught the Bears’ coverage flat-footed each time.
“We’ve always known that,” Jappe said, of the youngster’s abilities in the open field after an impressive junior high career.
On the latter two return TDs, Taylor muffed the kick at first before recovering to find only a sea of green grass ahead of him.
“It kept slipping through my hands but I kept having some great blocks out there,” he said.
Cline threw a nice deep ball 38 yards to Cline for the Pioneers’ only other second half score.
The Bears avoided a shutout when Gabe Saddler rushed for a TD from 7 yards out as 9 minutes, 32 seconds remained in the game. Kadyn Duran added another for Box Elder with 4:56 to play, against a defense of second- and third-stringers.
Without a homecoming or Chili Feed game, the Parent Night made for peak regular-season celebration on the Big Sandy sidelines.
“We’re keeping everybody healthy (and) spreading the ball around a bit,” Jappe said.
Pioneer pigskin faithful may be wise to keep an eye toward the schools’ website and Facebook page for schedule updates this week. Week 4 road opponent Heart Butte has been hampered by cancellations in the early going due to COVID-19 cases on the Blackfeet reservation. It is possible an alternate non-divisional opponent could be lined up if Heart Butte is unable to play, potentially even at home for the Pioneers.
