KINGDOM CITY, Mo. - The North Callaway Thunderbirds might just end up mining valuable profit from a painful setback.
North Callaway - after battling state-ranked Southern Boone to the end before falling 15-12 in last week's season opener - will get a second straight home game when the Thunderbirds face the Tipton Cardinals tonight. Kickoff is 7 p.m.
North Callaway took a 12-7 edge against Southern Boone - which climbed three spots to No. 7 in this week's Class 3 Missouri Media rankings - with 7 minutes, 30 seconds remaining in the game. Junior running back Jordan Delashmutt bulled his way into the end zone from 2 yards out on fourth down to put the Thunderbirds on top.
The Eagles, though, countered with a game-deciding drive. Jackson Sartain's 17-yard touchdown run with 3:14 left gave Southern Boone the lead for good.
Afterward, North Callaway head coach Kevin O'Neal could see the tangible toll the loss had on his Thunderbirds.
"You learn every week, win or lose, and we learned a lot about ourselves on Friday night," O'Neal said. "After the game, I saw kids that were upset, I saw kids that were wore out, that were tired.
"I told them to remember how that feels - the reason that they're upset and the reason they're down is because they gave it everything they had. They played with heart. That's what I asked them to do, and I thought they did that. It hurts a little more when you lose and you play that way. And it hurt - they believed they were going to win that game, and that's awesome."
Make no mistake, a loss doesn't sit well with O'Neal, but he liked the manner in which his squad challenged a quality opponent in the Eagles.
"It was a big test for us and I was very proud of how our kids responded," O'Neal said. "I've never doubted their effort. Sometimes we have a couple of practices that are up and down, but they give maximum effort.
"We've got a few little things that we need to clean up, but the most exciting thing for me on Friday night was to see them play for each other, and play as hard as they could for four quarters."
Tipton - coming off a disappointing 3-7 record in 2016 - launched its season with a 34-20 home victory against St. Paul Lutheran: Concordia last week. North Callaway cruised to a 42-8 blitz of the Cardinals last year in Tipton.
An offense that features jet sweeps has been a staple for Tony Braby, who is beginning his 20th season as head coach of the Cardinals. O'Neal, though, expects Braby to throw in some offensive tweaks.
"He adds a new little wrinkle every year, but it's essentially the offense that they've been running in Tipton for a long time," O'Neal said. " Off of their jet sweep, they have a lot of different things that they do, and I thought they executed probably their game plan (against Lutheran) the way Coach Braby wanted it to happen.
"They don't have the super-breakaway speed that they've had in the past, but they've got guys that are hard runners and a little bit of size up front on the line."
North Callaway's defense gave up 221 yards rushing to Southern Boone after limiting the Eagles to just 49 yards on the ground in the first half.
"They made some adjustments at halftime to take advantage of some guys that we had hurt," O'Neal said. "Some new guys in there, they kind of attacked that a little bit and made one more big play than we did."
The Thunderbirds suffered a critical blow last week when senior offensive guard/inside linebacker Tanner Pezold left the game in the early going with a pinched nerve in his left shoulder. O'Neal was hoping to have Pezold - the team's leading tackler last season - back tonight, but didn't rule out the possibility of resting him for next week's Eastern Missouri Conference opener at Mark Twain.
"He's out until he gains full strength back in that arm," O'Neal said. "We're going to ease him back into things to make sure he's ready for conference when it starts next week.
"We don't want to force him back too quick this week."
Senior running back Adam Reno rushed for 115 yards on 20 carries and had a 16-yard touchdown run last week as North Callaway tallied 167 yards on the ground.
"They executed the game plan like I wanted," O'Neal said. "We wanted to control the clock a little bit, we wanted to be able to run the football and I thought we were able to do that against a very good Southern Boone defense."
O'Neal was also encouraged by the performance of sophomore quarterback Tully Thomsen in his first varsity start. Thomsen was mostly steady, connecting on 8-of-11 passes for 51 yards and no interceptions.
"It was everything I expected from him," O'Neal said. "Tully is very critical of himself and there's things that he needs to improve. Early on, having a little bit of pressure in his face, got him a little bit antsy in the pocket and moving around.
"He had a good film session where he saw some of those things, things that he can get better at and I know he's going to work to get better at. I thought he did a very good job."
O'Neal explained Tipton's defense will most likely line up in a 3-3 stack, with ends on the edge.
"Coach Braby does a very good job of adjusting things to his personnel that he has," O'Neal said. "They've got some big guys inside on the defensive line that we're going to have to make sure that we're blocking and be prepared for the blitzing linebackers and the different things that you get out of that (scheme)."
Related podcast:
North Callaway Thunderbirds Football Podcast [Tipton preview, Aug. 25, 2017]