St. Albert edges out Riverside in a thriller

September 2nd, 2022 by admin

The St. Albert Falcons and Riverside Bulldogs played a doozy of a ballgame in Class A District 7 on Friday night in Oakland. Ultimately a couple of yards made the difference with St. Albert squeaking out a 30-28 win.

The two teams started slow but ramped up quickly. After three empty possessions to start the game the two teams traded 4 touchdowns in a span of 1:41 of game clock. Grady Jeppesen scored first for Riverside on a 14 yard run. Owen Marshall hit Brandon McCall for a 65 yard passing score for St. Albert. 1 play later Jeppesen hit Ayden Salias for a 75-yard scoring strike. Then 3 plays later Marshall hit Brendan Monahan for a 44 yard score. At that point it was 14-12 Falcons. Riverside scored on their next drive that lasted a bit longer. 13 plays and 65 yards later they scored with a Jaxon Gordon 1-yard plunge to make it 20-14 at half.

St. Albert took the lead back on their first drive of the second half after gaining possession on an interception by Monahan. He capped off the drive with a 3-yard rushing TD and the PAT by Kyle Irwin put St. Albert ahead 21-20. After forcing a Riverside punt they added a Marshall to Monahan 35 yard score to make it 27-20. Riverside didn’t go away. They got a 40 yard rushing score from Jeppesen with 6:30 to play and got the 2-pt conversion to make it 28-27 Riverside.

St. Albert then mounted a drive down the field, converting a big fourth down to get into the red zone. On a 4th and goal from the 11 the Falcons decided to try a field goal. Kyle Irwin just barely squeaked it over the crossbar from 29-yards out to make it 30-28 Falcons with 1:19 to play. Riverside then gave themselves a great chance to win. They marched down the field 55 yards to the 10. Jeppesen had a 19-yard run to get to the ten with :06 left to play. Jeppesen then lobbed it up to the corner of the end zone for Aiden Bell but the Falcons knocked it away to preserve the win.

Grady Jeppesen was 10-18 passing for 212 yards and 1 touchdown and also ran for 94 yards and 2 scores. Ayden Salais hauled in 4 catches for 134 yards and 1 touchdown. The Bulldogs fall to 0-2 and will next up travel to 2-0 Mount Ayr.

St. Albert got a big line from Monahan with 2 receiving and 1 rushing touchdown to go along with an interception. The Falcons improve to 1-1. Next up for them is a tough home game against Underwood.

Listen to a full postgame interview with Riverside Head Coach Darrell Frain below.