Sterling football bounces back, gets 5th win in blowout fashion

STERLING – It was a new week for Sterling after last week’s lopsided 63-6 road loss to No. 2 and undefeated Quincy.

Focused on better results on both sides of the football, Sterling put together a complete team win in Friday’s 47-14 Western Big 6 Conference win over Rock Island.

Sterling (5-3, 4-1 Big 6) got the ever important fifth win, passing last year’s four, after putting up more than 300 yards on offense.

Drew Nettleton threw three touchdown passes, two to Kaedon Phillips, as the Golden Warriors built a 37-7 halftime lead before a running clock was enforced in the second half.

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Phillips said the team worked on its defensive rotations and positioning on that side of the ball. It paid off against the Rocks (1-7, 1-4), who were 1 of 8 on third down and had just one play of 20 yards or more in the first half.

“We know we’re working for the playoffs,” Phillips said. “Just seeing what we’re doing with this team is really great this year.”

Sterling coach Jon Schlemmer said the team made the needed adjustments during practice leading up to the game.

“I think our execution early on, offensively, defensively, special teams, I thought was pretty strong,” Schlemmer said. “It’s a credit to our kids. It’s easy to kind of hang your head and feel sorry for yourself after you get your tail whipped, but they didn’t do that.

“They came back to work, and it was a fun night here tonight.”

Nettleton was 11-of-18 passing for 194 yards and Wyatt Cassens led the backfield with 45 yards rushing and a touchdown. Cassens also had a pick-6 in the third quarter to help make it a 40-point game. Cobey Shipma added 37 yards on the ground with a touchdown.

Quincy Maas caught a 36-yard touchdown pass for the first score of the game. Defensively, Will Ports had five solo tackles and Jeremiah Muhammad blocked a punt that resulted in a safety. Jimmy Wadsworth had an interception and also caught five passes for 71 yards.

Ryan Gebhardt was 6 of 6 on PATs and kicked his eighth field goal of the season to extend his single-season record. He has also tied Tony Diaz’s career record of 10 field goals.

Schlemmer said it’s “awesome” to have a complete team win like this one late in the season.

“That’s a total team win,” he said. “It’s all those guys. It was important to see our guys go out there and have the success they did.

“That’s what it’s all about, and that’s why we put all that hard work in.”

Sterling did not punt all night and had only one turnover, a Nettleton interception late in the game. Sterling made the playoffs with only four wins last year, but Schlemmer is not celebrating a fifth win.

“I think we’ll be ok with playoff points, but you know, go and get that sixth win and that’s pretty much going to guarantee it,” he said. “We want to keep playing and we want to keep rolling and doing this thing together.”

Sterling finishes the regular season at Moline next week. They beat the Maroons 22-17 last season in overtime.

“It’s going to be a dog fight,” Phillips said of the matchup. “We know what happened last year, it was a close game. Just working off what happened here and just executing.”