Raiders Fall in the Section Championship Game

Kam Kaiser photographed in the first game of the season by Jim Wellbrock
Kam Kaiser photographed in the first game of the season by Jim Wellbrock

By Joey Hudson

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The Northfield Raiders football team traveled down to face the number one seeded Huskies at Owatonna high school on Friday November 3rd for the class 1AAAAA section championship game. The Raiders were coming off their thrilling semi-final win over New Prague, and Owatonna coming off a dominant win over Rochester John Marshall.

The Raiders won the opening coin toss, electing to kickoff to start the game. On the opening kickoff from senior kicker Stephen Kallestad, the Raiders attempted a squib kick that bounced off the Owatonna kick return unit, and into the Raiders hands.

The Raiders first drive did not go as planned however, as after two runs were stopped after a few yards, the Raiders attempted a deep pass that was picked off by an Owatonna safety. With 6:45 left in the first quarter Huskies quarterback Jacob Ginskey dropped back from his own 42 yard line and hit Nolan Ginskey for a 58 yard touchdown to put Owatonna up 7-0.

On the Raiders next drive facing third and fifteen Raiders quarterback uncorked a deep ball to Kam Kaiser that drew defensive pass interference, however the Raiders were forced to punt after. In the second quarter Owatonna was deep in Northfield territory, but the Raiders were able to stuff them at the one yard line. The Raiders however were unable to get far out of there, and had to punt from their own end zone. Following a good return from Owatonna set them up at the Northfield 11 yard line, where it didn’t take them long to score.

In the second half the Raiders came out hot with Seth Thompson finding Kam Kaiser on 4th and 9 from the Owatonna 41 yard line for the score on a deep corner route from Kaiser. However Owatonna was able to get past the Raiders line on the extra point and block it to keep the Raiders at six points.

With 5:40 left in the third quarter Huskies quarterback Jacob Ginskey snapped off a touchdown run to put the Huskies up 28-6. In the fourth quarter Owatonna focused on draining as much clock as possible, which led to them adding one more touchdown to their total when running back Brennan Sletten ran for a score to make it a 35-6 game.

Northfield was unable to get anything going following that, taking home the loss as Owatonna knelt the ball to ice the game. With that loss the Raiders season ended, but it was not without its high points as a great season ends in a rough loss. Northfield live will now be moving on to winter sports with girls hockey scheduled to start on Thursday November 9th. Stay up to date for potential schedule changed on the calander on blog.northfieldlive.com and @northfieldlive on social media.