It's never a good idea to get a grizzly mad, especially a bunch of grizzlies wearing football uniforms.
But that's what happened Friday night when the Fruitland Grizzlies invaded Hailey's Phil Homer Field for the season-opening prep football game against Wood River's varsity.
Fruitland, winners of 72% of their football games this millennium, fumbled and stumbled and made mistakes and let Wood River methodically chip away for a 10-0 lead midway through the third quarter.
The Grizzlies turned the ball over three times on their first four offensive possessions. Early-season jitters? Perhaps. Wood River coach Mike Glenn ventured another guess about the first football meeting between the schools in 28 years.
"I think Fruitland came in feeling a little intimidated. There seemed to have a little uncertainty when they saw what we're trying to build here," said coach Glenn. "But Fruitland is a good team. They've got their game going."
The Grizzlies finally did Friday, re-directing anger at themselves for the early mistakes and taking it out on their hosts from Wood River.
Out-rushing Wood River 310-83 for the game, Fruitland put together three consecutive scoring drives covering 80, 78 and 52 yards in a 12-minute span of the second half and escaped with a 24-10 win. The Grizzlies had the ball for 18 of 24 minutes after intermission and finished with 21 first downs, to six for Hailey.
Fruitland fixed its fortunes by setting a trap for the Wolverines.
Actually, the Grizzlies rigged up a bunch of traps, trap blocking for misdirection runs, that is, and got the Hailey defenders running around in a state of confusion for the rest of Friday's non-conference game.
Glenn said, "The trap killed us. We couldn't stop it." And Wood River's tackling certainly wasn't great. "It wasn't a scheme thing. It was technique," added Glenn. "We left them in the game and they kept playing and playing."
Wood River's lack of experience in important positions was a factor, Glenn said. So was the fact that nine different Grizzly runners carried the ball led by senior Jake Fabricius (69 yards. The Hailey defense never knew who was getting the ball. And they got beat on the strong-side trap.
There were positive signs.
"We did some good things," Glenn said.
The Wolverine defense stopped Fruitland's first five-minute drive, helped by two holding penalties whistled against the Grizzlies.
Sparked by the running of junior Matt Libert (20 carries, 66 yards), Wood River embarked on a 18-play, 71-yard drive covering eight-and-a-half minutes that stalled at the Fruitland one-yard-line when the Grizzly defense stuffed two runs and forced a field goal by senior Cory Rutkowski.
Libert rambled through a huge hole for a 27-yard right end run, and sophomore quarterback Michale Brunker tossed two pass completions to senior Jeff Conover covering 27 yards. But the big play on the drive was a five-yard first-down run by Danny Ward out of field goal formation at the 30.
Getting three points instead of six was a consolation prize.
"When we kicked the field goal, it should have been a TD. It showed our lack of experience," Glenn said.
Rutkowski's soccer-style placekicking that boomed kickoffs way out of the end zone along with his punting (38.5 yards on 4 kicks) were also positive points. "We have potentially a great field goal kicker," said Glenn.
The offense clicked one more time after a Collin Hand fumble recovery, which was caused by a hard tackle by Corbin Miniard early in the third quarter. Wood River went for the whole ball of wax on the first play and played to one of its strengths.
Wood River stacked three receivers to the right and Brunker quickly threw left, lofting a high lead pass that 6-5 tight end Erik Jacobson caught in the end zone for a 16-yard scoring play and 10-0 Wolverine lead with 6:55 on the clock.
Glenn said, "We threw it up, Erik made a nice grab and scored. We executed very well."
But that was virtually the last time that the Wood River offense had an opportunity to strut its stuff. "The offense never got a chance to be on the field the rest of the second half," said Glenn, tipping his hat to Fruitland's blocking and ball-control offense.
Fruitland, trailing 10-8, was on the move. But the Wolverine defense seemed to have stopped the Grizzlies when, on third-and-10 near midfield, Chris Chapman tackled a screen pass short of first-down yardage.
That's when a roughing-the-passer penalty against Wood River moved the chains. Four plays later Fruitland scored and made the two-point conversion for a 16-10 lead.
Glenn said, "That penalty got them (Fruitland) over the hump psychologically. Lack of discipline hurt us a little in the second half."
The second-year head coach remained upbeat. He said, "We can fix the things that ailed us against Fruitland. Inexperienced kids will become more experienced. We'll get our quarterback back (junior Danny Kramer, due to return for Friday's Preston game).
"The biggest improvement a team makes is after its first game. I expect us to be significantly better against Preston. They have 18 seniors, but we'll try to keep our balance on offense and take advantage of our kicking game."
Preston in town Friday
Wood River (0-1) continues its eight-game regular-season slate Friday, Sept. 1 at Phil Homer Field in Hailey with a 7 p.m. non-league game against the 4A Preston Indians.
Preston (1-0), a 44-13 home winner over rebuilding Burley Friday, has won three straight football games over Burley, Hillcrest and Wood River dating back to last season. But the Indians (3-6 last season, 5-4 in 2004) haven't won a road game in four tries since 2004.
Wood River has never beaten Preston in five football meetings, but last year's 7-6 Indian win at Preston was by far the closest margin of the series. Preston had trounced Hailey grid teams by a 150-23 score including three lopsided contests from 1990-92 and a 52-0 result the last time Preston visited Hailey, in 2004.
Fruitland QB Trent Gatzemeyer (left) is thrown for a 10-yard sack by Wood River's Pat Hurley late in the second quarter in Friday's Hailey game won by the Grizzlies 24-10. On the next play Danny Ward picked off a Gatzemeyer pass and returned it 35 yards. Photo by Willy Cook
