The Ranger defense came up big when they needed to.

FHC’s Varsity Football team (2-0) defeated West Ottawa (0-2) on Thursday night. The game was sealed when the Ranger defense shut down the West Ottawa attack. With four minutes left in the game, senior Harrison Engler came up with a huge sack for a seven yard loss. It was followed by another sack on third and long by senior Alec Elzinga. On fourth and long, a West Ottawa pass was intercepted by senior Sal Sidebotham, assuring the win.

Earlier on in the fourth quarter, the Rangers were leading 21 to 14. FHC’s offense started a crucial drive in good field position. The entire possession, the Rangers were marching down the field. The offensive line was dominating West Ottawa, and the offense rode the one-two punch of senior running back Ty Collins and senior quarterback Tanner Hallock. Tanner dove into the end zone from the one yard line to put the game out of reach.

“We finished a ball game,” head coach Tim Rogers said. “This is the first time since I’ve been coaching here that we’ve finished a game. The game got tough and we lost momentum. We fought through some adversity and won the game.”

The offense was led by two senior quarterbacks, Tanner Hallock and Mark Scannell. Tanner accounted for one passing touchdown, along with two rushing touchdowns. Mark made some great completions and threw a touchdown pass to junior tight end Jace Thornton on a fake field goal.

“Tanner and Mark are both very capable,” Rogers said. “Both would start at most other places around the area. I think it speaks volumes to the unselfishness of those two kids. There isn’t one complaint that comes out of either of their mouths, and they give us everything they’ve got.”

Tanner gave credit to both the offensive and defensive lines. It was clear the Rangers won the line of scrimmage.

“I don’t think Mark and I could do anything without our offensive and defensive line,” Tanner said. “We put a lot of pressure on the West Ottawa offense and forced a lot of bad throws. No one could have gone anywhere without our offensive line, so big credit to them. I don’t think people realize how much they do for us.”

The two favorite targets for the Ranger quarterbacks were senior Jack Uecker and junior Bryce Clay. Jack scored on a beautiful 6 yard fade route thrown by Tanner. Jack also had some key third down catches to move the chains. Bryce had a handful of catches. His most important reception came in the fourth quarter when the Rangers needed to keep a big drive going. On the defensive side of the ball, Bryce had a huge hit and popped the ball free from a West Ottawa receiver. The fumble was recovered by Jace Thornton.

Coach Rogers is happy that the team is off to a 2-0 start, but he knows they need to get better every week.

“We could improve in a lot of ways,” Rogers said. “There were a lot of self-inflicted wounds, and we shot ourselves in the foot today making some big mistakes. We need to continue to work every week to force teams to beat us and not beat ourselves.”

The Rangers look to stay undefeated as they play at Grand Rapids Ottawa Hills next Friday at 7:00 PM.