Metro Sports Report

RoughRiders lanced by Omaha, 2-1

Sometimes you can play at a pretty high level game and still lose the silly hockey game.

Sometimes a winless team defeats an undefeated team, simply because the puck does not bounce your way all the time.

It happened to the Cedar Rapids RoughRiders Saturday night.

The Omaha Lancers handed the RoughRiders their first loss of the season, 2-1, before 2,035 customers at the Cedar Rapids Ice Arena.

Omaha arrived in town with an 0-3-1 record, compared to a spotless 3-0 mark for the RoughRiders. It's too early in the USHL to make any profound judgments about the league, however, and both clubs appeared to be fairly even in ability.

Cedar Rapids took a 1-0 lead in the first period when Andrew Gaus scored a shorthanded goal while the RoughRiders were killing a penalty. Nobody got an assist on the goal, but Casey Jerry created the action for Cedar Rapids when he broke away from the pack and fired a shot at Omaha goalie Hayden Hawkey.

Hawkey stopped Jerry's shot, but Gaus was in perfect position for the rebound and goal.

Akers helps No.1 Warriors top Prairie

Landen Akers had a few problems hanging onto punts Friday night, but he made amends with a huge play on defense.

Akers intercepted a pass near the goal line and raced 99 yards for a touchdown to help No. 1 Washington knock off Prairie, 28-6, at John Wall Field.

Washington led 21-6 with four minutes left in the game, but the Hawks marched to the 5-yard line and could have made it a tight game with a touchdown.

Akers had other ideas.

Prairie quarterback Dakota Simonsen lofted a fourth-down pass toward the end zone, but Akers saw it coming and made a clean interception. Akers is one of the top quarter-milers in the state and nobody was going to catch him once he got going.

"I saw he was throwing a fade route to the corner, so I just waited backand waited for the ball and went up and got it," he said. "It's pretty fun, because I made a few mistakes in the game earlier. I tried to make up for it."

Linn-Mar stuffs Cedar Falls, 22-14

When Linn-Mar played at Cedar Falls last season, the Tigers were able to run at will.

In Friday night's game at Linn-Mar Stadium, they couldn't run at all.

A fired-up Lions defense held the Tigers to minus-10 yards on the ground and the offense made enough timely plays that resulted in a 22-14 homecoming victory at Linn-Mar Stadium.

The victory clinched a Class 4A playoff spot for the No. 9 Lions (6-1 overall, 3-0 in District 5). They can secure no worse than a tie for the district title with a win next Friday at Waterloo West. Cedar Falls dropped to 5-2, 2-1.

Many of Linn-Mar's defenders in Friday's win were on the field last year when the Tigers ran for 449 yards in a 56-28 win.

"We came out here fired up ready to play Lion football," said senior defensive back Adam Stolley, who had a key interception. "We went 2-7 (last year) and that sucked for all of us.

J-Hawks fumble away shot at victory

What a win it would have been.

But Jefferson’s high homecoming hopes died Friday night at Kingston Stadium on a fumbled hand-off five yards from the goal line with nine seconds left in the game.

Waterloo West, which seemed to have things sealed just 30 seconds earlier with a score of its own, jumped on the loose ball to save a 23-17 victory.

“Missed opportunities and lack of execution,” said Jefferson Coach Brian Webb in trying to explain what went wrong at the end and throughout the night as a whole.

Behind from the start, the J-Hawks rallied back to tie the score at 17-17 with 4:38 left on a 21-yard field goal by Caleb Kesterson. A dropped pass in the end zone would have given them a touchdown the play before.