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Owls get revenge

Oscoda hangs on to defeat Houghton Lake in season opener

News Photo by Jonny Zawacki Oscoda quarterback Brayden Mallak (3) stiff arms Houghton Lake defender Sean Patti (20) during a football game on Thursday night at Oscoda High School. The Owls avenged a season opening loss last year against the Bobcats, winning by a final score of 14-12.

OSCODA — In last year’s season opener, Oscoda surrendered a touchdown late and suffered a 30-22 loss against Houghton Lake.

On Thursday, the Owls got revenge with a lot of hard work and a little bit of luck as they hung on to defeat the Bobcats by a final score of 14-12 at Oscoda High School.

“It was an ugly game, but Houghton Lake is a good team. I thought we did a heck of a job and the kids just played out of their minds,” Oscoda coach Mark Whitley said.

The story of the game was Oscoda’s defense, which was suffocating all night and gave Houghton Lake’s offense problems.

Oscoda recorded six sacks for the game, four of which came in the first half. The Owls held a 14-6 lead after a first quarter touchdown by quarterback Brayden Mallak who scampered into the end zone from nine yards out on Oscoda’s opening drive to give the home team a 7-0 lead.

“We were flying to the ball and put pressure on the quarterback. We have kids with motors and our defense really showed up tonight,” Whitley said. “We think we can score anytime we want and we didn’t have all of the punch that we needed tonight offensively, but we will, we’ll work to get better.”

The Bobcats cut the lead to one after Spencer Evans ran over and past Oscoda defenders on his way to a 29 yard touchdown to make the score 7-6 after one quarter.

The 29 yard touchdown run was Houghton Lake’s biggest play of the game and after that, the Owls clamped down defensively for the rest of the half.

Oscoda extended its lead with 5:22 left in the opening half when it put together a seven play drive that resulted in Andy Dault powering his way into the end zone from a yard out to give the Owls a 14-6 lead they took into halftime.

Houghton Lake seemed to have learn from its mistakes in the first half and came out with a run-heavy offensive game plan in the second half. It was effective in the third quarter as they played keep away from the Owl offense and only allowed Oscoda one offensive possession in the quarter.

The Bobcats chewed up nearly seven minutes of clock and cut the lead to two with 50 seconds remaining in the third quarter when they drove 57 yards on 12 plays and reached pay dirt when Brian Morgan rumbled his way into the end zone from two yards out to cut the lead to 14-12.

The Oscoda offense was unable to get into a rhythm and the Owls committed a costly turnover on fourth down near the red zone when Mallak was picked off on a fourth down and eight and the Bobcats ran the ball back to the Oscoda 31 yard line with 9:22 remaining.

Houghton Lake continued to pound the rock and chew clock, but on the eighth play of the drive and on a fourth and two from the 15 yard line, the Bobcats fumbled the snap and Oscoda’s Kaleb Foster hopped on the loose ball to give the ball back to Oscoda with 4:42 left to play.

Despite throwing the interception, Whitley remained confident in his team and Mallak’s ability to make plays as Mallak completed a few key passes down the field, one being on a fourth and eight near midfield to keep the drive alive and melt the game clock.

With under a minute remaining, Mallak made a big play with his legs, but fumbled the football, but fortunately for the Owls, they were able to hop on the loose ball at the two yard line and take two knees to end the game.

“I got confidence in the kids. Our coordinators have confidence in the kids and we don’t punt a lot and if we don’t get the first down, we’re going to do everything we can trying,” Whitley said. “We can’t make mistakes like we did late in the game and I’ll get on the kids for that, but they’re all great kids, we make mistakes, it happens, but we just have to do a better job cleaning it up and getting better for next week.”

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