Box score
A week ago in a big region game at Lone Peak, American Fork laid the proverbial goose egg in the second half, going scoreless and losing by three for its first loss of the season.
There’s no let up when it comes to quality opponents in Region 3, so all week American Fork coach Aaron Behm talked to his team about resiliency and the need to bounce back quickly.
American Fork did that in a big way on Friday night, and did so by flipping the second half script from a week ago.
The Cavemen held previously undefeated Pleasant Grove scores in the second half, as it cruised to the 31-10 home victory in exactly the type of bounce-back performance Behm was hoping for.
“We were really challenging our guys to play more physical than we did last week on both sides of the ball. I think that carried over, the competition we had in practice Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday carried over to both sides of the ball, and as the game went on, it seemed like we were getting stronger on both sides of the ball,” said Behm.
With two weeks left in the regular season, both teams now own a 7-1 overall record and a 2-1 record in region play.
American Fork’s defense played lights out nearly the entire game, outside of one major breakdown in the final seconds of the first quarter.
On a designed QB run by Pleasant Grove, American Fork’s defense over pursued to one side of the field, which allowed Carson Rasmussen to but back at the line of scrimmage as he raced 60 yards to the end zone giving the Vikings the 10-7 lead with eight seconds left in the quarter.
From there on out American Fork’s defense dominated, only allowing 10 first downs the rest of the way, but half of those came on defensive penalties.
For the Cavemen offense, going behind 10-7 wasn’t exactly the wake-up call the coaches were hoping for. Its offense went punt and missed field goal on it first two possessions of the second quarter, but the defense did its job quickly each time to give the ball back to the offense, which finally found a groove late in the second quarter.
Quarterback Dylan Story hit Jett Nelson on a 45-yard TD pass at the 4:07 mark of the second quarter for the 14-10 lead, and then on his team’s next possessions story connected with Davis Andrews for a 21-yard TD strike for the 21-10 halftime lead.
“They brought pressure tonight, similar to what we had last Friday and (Dylan) was better tonight than he was last Friday, and it’s only his eighth varsity start,” said Behm. “So he’s still learning, he’s still growing even though he’s a senior, and for help to step up, and he took some shots tonight, but he continued to hang in there and delivered some great passes.”
Behm thought one of the biggest sequences of the game came early in the third quarter, and not surprisingly it was spearheaded by his defense.
Pleasant Grove’s defense came out and forced a quick three and out, and after a bad American Fork punt it had great field position near midfield to try and fight back into the game.
Three plays later though, American Fork defensive back Justin Bourgeois made a diving interception to thwart any momentum the Vikings might’ve generated.
“Had they gone down and scored there it’s a four-point game, they’ve got momentum and it’s a totally different game, so his pick was huge,” said Behm.
He also thought the pressure that Drew Dickey and Waki Fulilangi provided on the defensive line was instrumental in holding Pleasant Grove’s offense in check.
Dax Watts helped ice the game for American Fork with a 1-yard TD run early in the fourth quarter.