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Craig airs out Parker

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Parker vs. Craig Football

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JANESVILLE — Bill O’Leary had only one wish Friday night.

In what has turned into a rollercoaster season, all the Janesville Craig High School football coach wanted was for his Cougars to play hard for 48 minutes.

Wish granted.

Joey Kennedy scored three touchdowns, and the Cougar offense finished with 385 yards in a 27-12 win over crosstown rival Janesville Parker in the battle for the Monterey Rock on Friday night.

Kennedy’s heroics lifted the Cougars to 4-2 in the Big Eight Conference, while the Vikings slipped to 3-3.

Craig raced to a 14-0 lead, but needed an 80-yard scoring drive in the third quarter to finally pull away from the Vikings. The Cougars captured the Rock for the second straight season and have now won 26 of 42 meetings between the two city schools.

“All darn year we’ve been talking about putting together a 48-minute game,” O’Leary said. “Tonight, for the most part, we did that.

“We played hard, but just because the jersey on the other side of the ball says Parker doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t be playing hard all the time.”

The Cougars utilized good field position to open up an early lead. Kennedy scored on a nifty 14-yard run late in the first quarter, and then added an acrobatic one-handed catch in the end zone for a touchdown as Craig led 14-0 with 2:24 left in the half.

Kennedy finished with nine catches for 115 yards and added another 48 yards on the ground.

The senior speedster said beating Parker eases the sting of losing two straight conference games after starting the season 3-0.

“This is something you’re going to remember the rest of your life,” Kennedy said of beating Parker his senior year. “It was definitely the funnest night of my life.

“I felt coming in to tonight that we were going to play a good game. We didn’t play very well last week at Middleton, but we put that behind us. This was Parker, and I’d never lost to them.”

The Vikings cut the lead to eight at halftime on Joe Allen’s 7-yard touchdown pass from Tyler Teubert, and got within two on their opening drive of the second half. LaVell Hewlett’s 6-yard scamper with 8:48 left in the third got the Vikings within two, but a two-point pass conversion failed.

Craig responded with a 14-play, 68-yard drive on the ensuing possession, capped off by Ben Olin’s 16-yard pass from Zach Bayreuther. With 297 yards passing and three more touchdown strikes, Bayreuther continues to put up impressive numbers.

“You got to give Craig credit,” Parker coach Joe Dye said. “They made more plays than we did and converted some big third downs.

“We have tremendous respect for Kennedy. He’s got great foot speed, and when he gets in open space, he can make plays. That’s what he did tonight.”

Trailing by eight, Parker had one opportunity to try to tie the game, but a sack and an incompletion foiled the drive.

Craig put the game away with an 80-yard drive, capped off by Kennedy’s third touchdown of the game—a 9-yard pass from Bayreuther.

Hewlett ran for 108 yards, but Parker’s passing game managed only 37 yards.

By staying a game behind front-running Verona and Middleton in the Big Eight, O’Leary hopes his team has righted the ship.

“If you can’t build some momentum off a game like this, you shouldn’t be playing football on Friday nights,” O’Leary said. “We’ll see how we respond against (Madison) East next Friday.”

CRAIG 27, PARKER 12

Janesville Parker 0 6 6 0—12

Janesville Craig 7 7 6 7—27

Scoring summary: JC—Joey Kennedy, 14 run (Mike Valentine kick). JC—Kennedy, 7 pass from Zach Bayreuther (Valentine kick). JP—Joe Allen, 7 pass from Tyler Teubert (kick failed). JP—LaVell Hewlett, 6 run (pass failed). JC—Ben Olin, 16 pass from Bayreuther (kick blocked). JC—Kennedy, 9 pass from Bayreuther (Valentine kick).

Statistics: First downs—JP 11, JC 19. Rushes—JP 35-135, JC 26-88. Yards passing—JP 37, JC 297. Passes—JP 10-7-0, JC 40-25-1. Fumbles—JP 1-0, JC 3-1. Penalties—JP 5-41, JC 7-74.