After watching the semifinals, although Ankeny has a lot of talent on offense, going to go with SEP - 10
Ankeny vs SEP
- Thread starter Reasoned
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These are two really good teams. This site is garbage. Luke must have moved on just let this site go because the spam makes it unbearable.
There is no doubt SEP has a big O Line and quality skills among Isaiah Emanuel, Jaxon Dailey, Xavier N., and others (didn’t double check those spellings so some may be wrong). But I will be the contrarian and say that the Ankeny / Dowling game was the state championship game and take Ankeny. Why you ask? Because, while SEP certainly has lots of pieces as I mentioned they haven’t (in my mind) “proven” anything. Their only decent win was a week 1 (21-10) win against Waukee.... after that nada. That’s my 2 pennies.
Southeast Polk fan here. Yeah, I have two concerns: 1) SEP's path to the finals has been much easier--one game vs a top 10 team (Pleasant Valley) and that ended up 50-10. 2) We've been blessed with good placekickers in the recent past; this year we are 0-1 on field goals! Not a good omen in what I feel will be a close game.
I disagree that their only decent win was vs Waukee. We were down at the half, and Dailey's accuracy at the beginning of the year was not even close to what it has been recently. In week 3 SEP beat Valley 34-7, and that's when they had 4* recruit Jake Rubley at QB. The next week Ankeny beat Valley 35-10, and that was with Rubley now ineligible.
This shapes up to be a highly competitive game. I think with all the playmakers on both sides, this game comes down to turnovers or missed tackles. Could be the best 4A title game in quite awhile.
I think playing Dowling and having a lot of weapons taken away and having to figure out ways to still produce yards will benefit Ankeny greatly. The biggest problem with stopping Arland Bruce is that he’s not used purely as a receiver. A good defensive team can take away a star receiver fairly easily if they commit the resources. But they play him mostly as a RB now because there is no way to keep the ball out of a RB’s hands. They can hand him the ball whenever they want. So if you over commit resources to help stop him in the run game you now can’t do as much as you would like with their receivers. Long story short, in the HS game it’s harder to take away the star RB than the star WR because you can’t keep the ball out of his hands to start with.
Ankeny didn’t have Bruce when they beat Valley. And Rubley didn’t really impress much when he did play. It should be a good game, looking forward to it.
I'll say SEP 32-24. Both have great skill players, but I like the SEP D line better than the ankeny O line. However, I'm an eastern iowa guy so have only seen a little of each.
One thing that is not talked about and might be key to tonight's game, Bruce was playing RB because Ankeny's starting RB Kadolph was injured. Is Bruce a better RB, yes, he is a D1 player, however, Kadolph was one of the top RB's in the state and probably the fastest prior to getting hurt. If Kadolph is healthy tonight and they both play, might be dynamic. Will be a good game.
If they take Bruce and use him as a receiver the majority of the game it will be the biggest mistake they could ever make. You can still throw to him out of the backfield on swing, wheel, and screen passes if they want. Also, motion him out into an empty backfield and into a route. We shall see what they do and what happens but he’d be back their 85% of the time if I were in charge of it.
Halftime observations:
1) Bruce best player on field.
2) Ankeny OL doing just fine against SEP DL.
3) SEP coaches need to learn to manage clock. That last 55 seconds were atrocious. Looked like Hawkeyes
4) SEP doesn't seem ready for big time. ( QB missing a lot of short throws, big time punt muff).
Still anyones game.
1) Bruce best player on field.
2) Ankeny OL doing just fine against SEP DL.
3) SEP coaches need to learn to manage clock. That last 55 seconds were atrocious. Looked like Hawkeyes
4) SEP doesn't seem ready for big time. ( QB missing a lot of short throws, big time punt muff).
Still anyones game.
Ankeny’s offense looks much more potent tonight (than semifinal), QB has thrown much better and defense is MUCH more aggressive. You can tell SEP is not used to playing from behind...or tight for that matter.
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That’s because as I’ve been trying to tell folks for a while, Dowling would have beat SEP. SEP didn’t beat anyone this year. Too bad the Dowling/Ankeny game wasn’t played as the title game.
Hats off to Ankeny. Completely outplayed and outcoached SEP. SEP's '3-Headed Monster' of D1 recruits looked mediocre at best. Nwangpa afraid to mix it up; SEP's coach a terrible play caller. Put the ball in Nwangpa's hands once the entire night. Clock management has been poor for him his entire career. Kudos to Ankeny.
SEP got man handled.. for all the talk about them being so big in the trenches, after their first offensive drive that was non existent. Ankeny stuffed them with their biggest DL men at 230. Daley was once again outplayed by Bauer, just like last year. Still dont see the D1 hype with him. Xavier wasnt a factor and killed SEP with the muffed punt. Im not sure what SEP deal was. They got down and didnt respond. Seemed like they quit in the second half. They played a weak schedule, people forget last year Ankeny could of won by 21+ last year and Ankeny brought back alot of pieces from last year. Im not suprised by this one bit. Like people said, Dowling- Ankeny was the championship game.
No question that game got away from SEP and they were out gunned by Ankeny. With respect to the SEP size advantage on the line, I’m reminded of the General Patton quote about “fixed fortifications (think slower big linemen) are monuments to the stupidity of man” (not the players or coaches but the idea they can’t be beat with mobility). There’s another saying, “size punishes but speed kills”.
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