Cedar Falls Iowa — The Western Christian football team made the most of their first trip to the UNI Dome. The offense produced 21 points and the defense produced a stop on 4th down from their own 8 yard line with 41 seconds left to play. It all added up to a 21-17 win over Van Meter.
The Wolfpack move on to the 1A State Final on Friday at 11am as they go against five time defending champion Iowa City Regina. The Regals downed Dike New Hartford 31-14 in the other semi final.
Western will enter the final with an 11-2 record with the defending champions coming in at 12-1.
The Wolfpack opened the scoring on an 80 yard punt return by Taylor Miedema. Riley Van’t Hull added the extra point and Western led 7-0 with 4:14 left in the first quarter.
Van Meter evened the score on a Carson Rhodes 4 yard run with 1:21 left in the first quarter.
a 1 yard run by Ben Granstra and Van’t Hull’s extra point put the Wolfpack back in front with 11:32 left in the second quarter.
A 31 yard field goal and a 12 yard pass play with 43 seconds to play in the half would give Van Meter a 17-14 halftime lead.
The only scoring in a second half dominated by defense came when Western took the lead on a 1 yard run by Granstra on fourth down with 4:06 to play.That set up the late game heroics by the defense. Joey Horstman broke up a pass over the middle with Van Meter at the Western 8 yard line with 41 seconds left in the game. Western got the win 21-17 to advance to the Friday 11am 1A championship game against Iowa City Regina.
