Wildcats will host LCC in their first home game of 2020
HARTINGTON — Well, at least the Hartington-Newcastle football team finally got back on the field.
After two weeks of cancellations prompted by a COVID-19 result within the program, the Wildcats were set to play Plainview last weekend.
Then, COVID-19 reared its ugly head at Plainview, putting another Wildcats game on ice.
However, head coach Cory Uldrich didn’t want to sit idly by and watch another week slip through his fingers. He got on the phone, and started making calls. At first, it looked as though the Cats might play a western Kansas team, but then HNS was able to schedule Iowa’s Woodbine High School in a lastminute pickup game.
Ultimately, the Wildcats fell 50-8 at Woodbine.
“Woodbine is a team that will make a deep playoff run in Iowa,” Uldrich said. “They have a running back/linebacker in Layne Pryor who has committed to play at South Dakota. They were more physical and dominated the line of scrimmage on both sides of the ball.”
Riley Sudbeck threw for 63 yards while Kobe Heitman ran for 68 yards and a score to lead the Wildcats attack.
Jake Peitz caught three passes for 54 yards.
Hartington-Newcastle (1-1) will face Laurel-Concord-Coleridge (3-1) 7 p.m. Friday in the first District contest of the season
“LCC is another team who is very physical and will want to run the ball right at us,” Uldrich said. “We are going to have to make some strides in playing more aggressively in our second level. Playing last week was like a first game all over again, and it really showed in many aspects of the game. We have to make strides in the he game in order to move to the mental aspect of the game in order to move to the next level of the game.”
With all the COVID-19 distractions, the Wildcats have found a way to stay focused and moving forward.
“We are doing our best to make this season just about football, and it was nice to be back on the field again this week,” Uldrich said. “It had been 21 days between games. We’ll be excited to try and get ourselves back into the groove of weekly games.”
While the Hartington-Newcastle football program has been on shakey ground due to COVID-19 cancellations, the Cedar Catholic Trojans are seizing their opportunity ten-fold.
The Trojans moved to 4-0 this season with a 21- 13 win over David City last week and now move on to play at BRLD at 7 p.m. Friday in hopes of keeping the good mojo going.
“We knew going into this game that David City would be a much improved team, and they showed that they are,” CCHS head coach Chad Cattau said. “They play a very aggressive defense and really attack the line of scrimmage so it was good to face a team like that.”
Stay in the know!
To get news alerts on your cell phone, get the Cedar County News app in the ITunes store or in the Google Play Store.