LAKE STEVENS — Another week, another dazzling offensive display for Lake Stevens.
Whether it was completed deep shots downfield from quarterback Conor Bardue or a blend of powerful and elusive running from Blake May, the Vikings’ offense had its way with Glacier Peak on Friday night at Lake Stevens High School.
The defense impressed, too, shutting down what was one of Wesco’s top scoring offenses through the first half of the season.
“One of our goals was to start fast,” Lake Stevens coach Tom Tri said. “We wanted to put points on the board early and put some pressure on them just to have to come back. It’s a rivalry game. GP is Snohomish and we’re Lake Stevens, and we’re neighbors and so even though we haven’t really played each other in a league game before, we definitely circled this on our calendar.”
The Vikings opened up an early three-touchdown lead, established a second-half running clock with 21 seconds remaining to play before halftime and rolled to a 54-3 Wesco 4A win over Glacier Peak.
The victory kept Lake Stevens’ perfect record intact at 6-0.
Bardue carved up the Grizzlies’ secondary, completing 16 of 20 passes for 289 yards and three touchdowns, all before halftime. The junior QB had five first-half completions of 20-plus yards, and received plenty of help from Lake Stevens’ many talented pass-catchers.
Anthony Hutchinson finished with four catches for 101 yards and a touchdown, Austin Murren had 79 yards on three receptions and a 12-yard score, Jake Rasmussen caught three passes for 67 yards, and May and Hunter Eckstrom had touchdown receptions of 13 and 8 yards, respectively.
“It’s hard as a play-caller, I got four receivers that all run great routes, understand space, go catch the ball, get some (yards after the catch),” Tri said. “I almost write it down and script it, so I’m making sure that Hutch gets the ball, so J-Ras gets the ball, so that Hunter’s getting his touches and Blake’s getting his touches.”
Glacier Peak, after winning three straight games, suffered its second consecutive lopsided loss. The Grizzlies (2-2 Wesco 4A, 3-3) struggling mightily at home last week against Monroe, and it was much of the same against Lake Stevens.
GP’s sophomore quarterback, Ayden Ziomas, completed just 11 of 25 passes for 74 yards, but he didn’t receive much help from his wideouts, who dropped several passes.
Glacier Peak’s only score came early in the second quarter on a 23-yard field goal from Kevin Ramsey.
“The main thing is the sun still shines the next day,” said Glacier Peak coach Nick Bender, when asked his postgame message to the team. “We knew this was the meat of our schedule — very tough opponents back-after-back-after-back.”
May, who finished with 103 rushing yards on 15 carries, scored the game’s first three touchdowns for Lake Stevens (4-0 in Wesco 4A play). He scored on runs of 21 and 5 yards and hauled in a 13-yard TD reception.
After Glacier Peak’s field goal trimmed Lake Stevens’ lead to 20-3 with 9:20 to play in the second quarter, the Vikings reeled off 27 straight points to lead 47-3 at the half. The rest of the game was played with a running clock.
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