Last year’s Park-Burnsville game was a wild one, with the Wolfpack winning a 41-39 thriller.
This year’s game was anything but close as the Wolfpack rolled to a 48-6 victory Friday …
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Last year’s Park-Burnsville game was a wild one, with the Wolfpack winning a 41-39 thriller.
This year’s game was anything but close as the Wolfpack rolled to a 48-6 victory Friday at Burnsville’s Pates Stadium.
Park won a wild 41-39 thriller over Burnsville last fall, scoring the winning touchdown with 3:46 to play. On Friday, Park scored what turned out to be the winning touchdown with 7:01 to play in the first quarter.
The 42-point margin of victory was Park’s largest since a 69-20 win over North St. Paul in the 2016 season.
“With all the eventfulness of the evening we had a lot of guys that had to step up and play some different roles and I was proud of them,” said head coach Rick Frylund.
The Wolfpack dominated all facets of the game – offense, defense, special teams, and even extra-curricular activities. Park rolled up 435 total yards while holding the hosts to 69. Park had 287 yards rushing and 148 yards in passing, and 22 first downs to 10 for Burnsville.
The two teams also combined for 137 total yards in penalties, 52 for Park and 85 for Burnsville. And one celebration from the Wolfpack, when players went over to celebrate a touchdown with the student body drew a harsh reprimand from head coach Rick Fryklund.
Park also suffered the loss of junior running back Ben Andrews very early in the game. After getting hit on a play and lying motionless on the field for several minutes, he was eventually carried off the field on a stretcher by first responders while both teams and fans gave him an ovation.
“He still has some tingling however more and more feeling is returning to him,” Frylund said of Andrews immediately after the game. “He knows where he was, he knows where he is I should say. He’s getting better, no concussion but with a tinglingly they obviously need to be very careful.”
Park’s players were eager to credit their inspired play to what happened with Andrews.
“The highlight of the game for me, obviously our brother Ben Andrews went down, and it was sad for all of us but the biggest thing for me was Brevin Vang and Zach Carr both stepped up at the t-position and played big time for us,” said Park senior starting quarterback Miskir Esayas. “Zach got two touchdowns. Brevin was in there doing his job right and just executing for us and that obviously helped us put up a big score and get it done.”
“We played the game for our brother,” he got injured early on in the game,” said junior lineman Sebastian Vogel. “So this game was all for him, we played for him.”
“This week, we did improve just a little bit, but East Ridge was a little bit better than this team by a lot,” said senior Jonah Vogel. “We also had an emotional wave because Ben did get injured and we thought he wasn’t going to play but he is getting better. And that was the reason why we did put up such a score. But we do have a lot to improve on right now. But we’ve got to be happy with this win and we’ve got to bring it next week.”
Esayas had himself a night, connecting on 11 of 16 passes for 123 tards and three touchdowns and running 8 times for 56 more yards. Lead running back Kody Aikens didn’t do badly either, rushing for 137 yards and a touchdown on just nine carries. Naod Tewelde run for 72 yards and a score.
Esayas was also quick to credit the play of the offensive line. “Coaches told me the biggest thing for me was just controlling the offense and getting the flow, just moving the ball, moving the chains and getting a rhythm going. I felt like I did a pretty good job of that today but obviously that wouldn’t be possible without my teammates and without the o-line for sure.”
“I think the o-line played pretty well tonight,” said right guard Hunter Gross. “We were on top of everything and we were just working as a team together.”
Park's two quarterbacks connected with seven different receivers, with Zack Carr leading the way with 2 receptions for 52 yards, including the game’s first touchdown, a 42-yard pass from Esayas.
Aikens gave Park a 14-0 lead in the first quarter on a 64-yard run. Carr made it a 21-0 game with an 11-yard run in the second quarter.
The Wolfpack then scored three times in the third quarter, on Esayas passes to Dominic Dean and Matthew Kamande and a 9-yard run by Tewelde. Jacob Czarnota passed 25 yards to Eyuel Miftah for Park’s final score.
Park rolled to a 48-0 lead before Burnsville got on the scoreboard in the game’s final minutes.
“Some things were clicking,” said Fryklund. “We’ve got plenty of stuff that we’ve got to work on.”
Defensively, Park junior linebacker Keon Moody had five tackles to lead the Wolfpack. Defensive lineman Robert Schmitzer has two tackles, an assist, two sacks and two tackles for losses. Lineman running mate Jesse Wright had two tackles, an assist, a sack and two tackles for losses.
“We made a lot less mistakes on defense than we did the last game,” said Wright. “A few mistakes the last game cost us the game and unfortunately that’s what it comes down to.
Burnsville couldn’t successfully throw the ball – the Blaze were just 3 of 7 passing for 6 yards and that allowed the Wolfpack to gang up to stop the run. Burnsville was just 1 of 8 in third down conversions.
Park travels to Buffalo (1-1) Friday, Sept. 13, with a 7 p.m. kickoff. Park dropped a 39-34 game to Buffalo a year ago at Cottage Grove. Buffalo beat Hopkins 37-20 last weekend.
Metro-Maroon standings
Conf Overall
Park 1-0 1-1
Buffalo 1-0 1-1
Eastview 1-0 1-1
Burnsville 0-1 0-2
Hopkins 0-1 0-2
Roseville 0-1 0-2
Friday night’s scores: Park 48, Burnsville 6; Buffalo 37, Hopkins 20; Eastview 9, Roseville 6.
